My line of work

[Bird-Nerd]

To explain why I may be gone for extents of time during the summer, I'll give you a look into my exciting yet increadibly miserable and exhausting career of a Wildfire Fighter!

My very first job was local. It was pretty easy since my work was less then a quater mile away from my house.
http://www.simviation.com/yabbuploads/LaPinefire.jpg

To explain why I may be gone for extents of time during the summer (notthat anyone would notice), I'll give you a look at my exciting yet increadibly miserable and exhausting career

Then there was the summer of 2003, the Davis Fire was a funfest!

the smoke plume goes into Washington, idaho, and montano, all the way from Central Oregon.

true story on the fire line I shall protect the identity of my companions by calling them companion.

I yell "Dude, I think we should fall back aways since we got a tanker (retardent plane) coming in!"
My Companion 1 yells back "Nah, It won't be here for a bit cause they got to take off from Redmond, so shut up and keep working!"
Campanion 2 yells "Um, dude, there sort of a tanker coming from right over there" he points at it and we look... It's not the famous Aero Union Tanker 27 (or is it?) but it's the same type of plane.

Companion 1 "It's going somwhere else! Keep freakin' working on the **** perimeter you lazy ****nuggets!"
I counter his colorful speach; "Um, boss, it's got it's flaps down..."
Companion 1 calmly replies as he throws down his Pulaski, "FIND SOME **** COVER" as the tankers doors come open and the wonderful sticky red liquid known as retardent covers the parts of us that aren't covered, which is just about all of our bodies since all there was was a semi hollowed out log.
Companion 2 "I should reconsider my career path"
Campanion 1 "Shut up and get back to work!"

as you can tell "Companion 1" is all about the business. Being coverd in retardent isn't very comfortable, also it means thet the fire is advancing towards you, luckily we got the call to get out of there before the "Boss" got us killed.

and the only other exciting thing this summer at the end of the baker fire, we were packing up to go home and my pulaski fell from the back of a Fire truck (6 feet) and onto my foot. Ow . I'll be off the line for awhile now.

[beaky]

Well, at least you'll burn slower all soaked with retardant...

I respect your line of work- we ought to be able to just let wildfires  do their thing, but we've gotten rid of so much forest and built so close to what's left that we just can't afford to lose that much (not to mention the hazard to property). So someone's got to try to contain them.
 And it ain't easy, or safe.

[CTA0022]

Well, at least you'll burn slower all soaked with retardant...

I respect your line of work- we ought to be able to just let wildfires  do their thing, but we've gotten rid of so much forest and built so close to what's left that we just can't afford to lose that much (not to mention the hazard to property). So someone's got to try to contain them.
 And it ain't easy, or safe.

not a good idea where i live...we really appreciate their help

[Bird-Nerd]

Well, at least you'll burn slower all soaked with retardant...

lol
the fire in the first picture actually is in the middle of several neighborhoods including the one I live in, But the La Pine fire was over in a day and a night, The Davis fire went on for a long long time it seemed like. If we let those fires roam freely I would'nt get any hazard pay and would have to work at taco bell  :o

It's good to know that you guys appreciate us since the lodge owners seemed pretty miffed that we weren't stopping the fire faster, even though we were fatigued and alot of accidents could have happened if we worked any harder.

[Ivan]

When do the guys at Washington DC realize that a 30 ton water bag on a helicopter works way better than a ww2 oldtimer...

[Bird-Nerd]

During one particullar fire back when the USFS cut most of it's contracts with Air Tanker companies because of a couple of old planes crashing, we had 10 small helicopters constantly flying back and forht with the bambi buckets along with at least two skycranes, I think there was a S.E.A.T. flying in and out as well. Although we had to make the Fire Line thicker because of the lack of retardant to reinforce the perimeter lines, the helicopters did good and luckily the fire was out in a flat area, but sometimes the retardent planes were the only thing that was able to make some fires somewhat containable.

One time in a very hilly area were had a hell of a time keeping the fire contained because of the tendancey to burn upward, a skycrane saved us just in the nick of time when it dropped a humongous load of water into it, although the scary part was we saw alot of the water evaporate in mid air, so much of it that the smaller bambi bucket copters must have had little affect.

Butler Aviation had an A-26 back in the 70's, but they gave it to the canadians who then wrecked it.

[Willit Run]

God Bless you and the everyone else that does the work you do!!!

[Bird-Nerd]

Thank you, that really makes me fell good.