Aren't helicopters ugly by definition?

Holy Cow!!

This thread was prophetic!!

We were driving back through town on Wednesday when I saw a column of smoke. Everything is dry as tinder here and the humidity is around 10-15%, so smoke is NOT something anyone wants to see. As a retiree, I consider it my duty to spot these situations and go gawking. Someone had been grinding on a metal piece and the sparks had ignited the brush nearby. We got grandstand seats across the highway and watched the action develop.

Full grown Pinion pines were burning to twigs in 20 seconds. As soon as I got home, I earmarked several near my house that are coming down. (Click on the photos to see the larger version)


The cavalry came riding in looking a lot like Bob Hoover:


Then they brought in the heavy equipment, right over the exotic jerky sign


We had front row seats










It took several passes to squash that fire and, OK, I did get a few drops on me as they went overhead, but nothing worse than the "wet seats" at "O" in Vegas. Besides, like I said, the humidity was really low. The only scary part happened on our way up the hill to the house. I looked back down and saw this:


That building in the lower right is the ONLY liquor store in town. Made me break into a cold sweat thinking of the the tops popping off those bottles of Moose Drool. If that place had gone up, I think an evacuation would have been in order!

Whew!
YB

GREAT shots YB! The same bird no? You were a lot closer, did you notice if the pilot was of the female persuasion? The local fish wrapper commented on that during my local fire but no further info, as to how she ended up in the right seat of that monster. A good story I'm sure!

Thx CG,

Yeah, I think it IS the same aircraft. I think it's based here in Cedar City as I've seen it working some fires in Zion last year. This was a convenient fire for the crew, about 3-5 miles from KCDC and we have a lake out in the valley now thanks to all the run off this year.

I wasn't close enough to detect eye shadow or mascara behind the pilot's visor, but looks like the air attack mission is attracting more and more females. Even Patty Wagstaff is signed up! http://photorecon.net/patty-wagstaffs-second-act

Of course, all the lookers go to California and get a sexy OV-10 to fly instead of your grand daddy's old Commander.

YB

Buddy is a training pilot on the cranes...him at work few weeks ago in Malaysia

Here's one being worked on in Corvallis:

SDG&E has two of them working out of a hangar two rows from me... One is red white and blue like the one pictured above,in fact I think that is the SDG&E bird.. and the other one is orange and says Ericson sky crane on it... damn things shake the ground and hangar doors when they come in for a landing....looking closer I see the first picture is of the orange one here.... They are building an new power line into San Diego from the East and the cranes do the tower lifting...that pix is at one of their landing sites in the east county...

Our member here Kenny Chapman fly's one for Erickson.