Today's Large Incident Fire Update

We are on the MEU (#8)

"Wild" Fires

This smoke filled sky is one of the clear ones. There were so many amazing smoke filled skies I would have love to have taken photos of to show everyone how eerie the skies looked, but it's impossible to try to photograph everything I see out there.

At the end of my first day dropping water on fire in Engine 58

Buckets fly differently than those a/c units and electrical boxes that go on roof tops.

The local Willits Fire Dept. Engine posed with our Sikorsky for a group photo.

Wild doesn't even begin to describe the things I've seen while fighting fire in Northern California. So many things that words cannot describe out here. The first few days I was mostly amazed at how many back yards grow "pot" in their yards. Pot up here is like rose gardens where I live. Every one's got one. It's pretty cool to see from above. Most of the dip sights(where I get water from for the bambi bucket) are sources of water for most of these little pot gardens. Today, I was in awe of the one house that I was dipping from. First, on the way out to this one of hundreds of fires I flew past many many fires and thought to myself, wow, it looks like the world is coming to an end, every where you look there is a fire. It had appeared that mother nature bombed the earth with her lightning. Smoke filled the skies to the point where you almost can't see. You adapt to flying it the low visibility. It's strange because at first, I'd say no way am I flying in this, but then you do, and somehow it just works. It's wild! Anyway, I arrived to this one fire near the coast, it was as if that was where the wall was for the smoke to stop going south, it opened up and it was clear, it was crazy and beautiful and strange because the marine layer covered the entire ocean for as far as the eye could see, and the smoke lifted from the earth and went thousands of feet up into the sky to create a layer high above that extended south and east and west, and of course north for who knows how far, pretty much past as far as the eye could see. It was wild again. Anyway, this house sat atop this mountain, all by itself, on a vineyard, a beautiful little rolling hilltop vineyard surrounded by tall tall tall pine trees, hundreds of feet tall. The house had a 360 degree view and a little pond, my dip sight. The dip sight was in between all those tall trees, so that added to the excitement and challenge. From flying in smoke and flying up and down super steep terrain, this flying I've done these past few days has been some of the most technical flying I have done that I can remember. Even one of our Helco's(helicopter coordinators) said this is some rugged terrain. Some areas are too steep for handcrews to hike into, that's where we come in with our buckets and help out.

Currently we are based at Ells Field in Willits, CA. It's pretty much the middle ground between all of the fires in the surrounding area. After flying in the hundreds and hundreds of miles of thick smoke today, the satellite photo I had posted days ago looks like a clear day. I believe at this point, you can't see Northern California from space with all the smoke.

Smoke smoke smoke and more smoke

Look at what the local papers are saying about this piece of fire history going down......

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080628/ap_on_re_us/wildfires

They say to stay indoors, but most people especially in our line of work do not have a choice.


Today while dropping water the smoke was so thick that my eyes started to burn and water while hanging my head out the door into the dip sight. Soon as I started flying the wind cleared them. Never flown in such thick smoke before. It's quite the experience. Very rewarding and challenging and in an odd way, fun!

This is what the local Ukiah paper says.........(this is the town we are hoteling in.)

http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20080627/NEWS/375796692/1350&title=Ukiah_residents_flock_to_fresh_coastal_air

Flying in the smokey skies of Northern California....

Photo taken after my first day of dropping water from the 58T on fires.

"Little Mo" was my first 58T to drop water with.

Every chance I get I try to get online and read and post your comments and put my thoughts for the day on the internet. hahaha. I couldn't let a day go by without posted something if not at least a short blog for the day. If I could only tell you all the adventures that we have had the past two days. It has been quite interesting and exciting and that's all I can say. But I will tell you as I just lay down in my hotel bed tonight all I can smell is smoke in my hair. My hair smells of forest fire smoke from flying in it all day. Today was one of those great days where many firsts had taken place. Just about every day something new happens in my life that I can call a first, but today was an even more special first. After three years of flying fires in a type three (the small ones) helicopter which is the Astar, I finally made it into a medium, the S58T. I had my first experiences dropping water on a fire in the 58T today. It was extremely different to fly vs. the Astar. It was challenging and fun.

My first fire/s of the season

This satellite image only shows larger fires over a certain acreage that can show up from space. There are more fires than what you see in this image.

You can see all of the fires up in Northern California. Most of them are recent starts by lightning with some crazy and unusual storms rolling through the area. Ours is the Mendocino

Lightning Complex.

I'm with our Chief pilot Sam Nowden up in Mendocino County on what was called the June Lighting Complex, now the Mendocino Lightning Complex. Lots of fires here. Somewhere around one hundred or so in the area we are working. All tiny little starts started by lighting in June. For those not familiar with fire, the complex means there are multiple fires on the fire we are working. Within our fire are so many more fires. The reports say there are hundreds of fires in northern California, but that's just the bigger ones. On our complex alone there are countless fires I was told. The weather is cooler up here right now. Had been in the 90's but now it's in the 70's. Nice break from L.A. weather. It's beautiful up here as always. Lot's of wildlife. As we left the helibase yesterday the deer were coming out to graze on the field. Pretty cool.

Flying in the Heat and Aguila Uno's last days flying

Probably the last photos I will have had taken of me flying Aguila Uno as she will be retiring this upcoming week. These were taken last week in the hot afternoon flying out of VNY by Kevin Takumi(FOX camerman/reporter). Thanks Kevin! Thankfully there was a nice hot north wind that day giving me that extra boost of lift coming off the hot ramp. I'd normally be hovering only inches off the ground without the wind. hahaha

It's been an incredibly hot couple of weeks. I do not recall it ever being this hot for so long. Record breaking heat as they say. It seems hotter to me flying here in L.A. in this heat than any fire I have flown on, except when flying PSD missions as you are flying right next to fire and that's pretty darn hot. But it's not for the entire day. The heat here just isn't letting up. At night when it cools to the 90's it seems so wonderful! I can't believe how the 90's seem cool. After being in the low 100's all day it is cool. Last week I spent the whole week mostly flying TV 34, Aguila Uno. She's on her last leg so to speak. She is going into retirement as the contract that the company has with the station is coming to it's end date. It's actually been kind of sad to think about this tough little jetranger not flying news for 34 any longer. This was my first news gig when I started flying news in 1998 when I was first hired on with Helinet. This machine was a great tool to break into news with as she is alot harder to maneuver at max gross weight especially in this heat vs. an astar. Pretty much every flight last week was a high density altitude one in this little hard working B2 Bell. It's always better to start out in the tougher ships then start in one with loads of power and then have to learn to fly something without power. Luckily most of the stations I have been flying for love the beach shots, so we are able to get some relief flying along the coast. That has been what has made this past week of flying extremely enjoyable. How many people have jobs where they cruise the coast in a helicopter daily.

Flew today, monday the 23rd, and wow, what a relief from the heat finally. Both a.m. and p.m. shifts were much much cooler in Aguila. I will be flying Auguila one last time tomorrow morning then I'm headed up north to a fire in Boonville. I will eventually get back to comments. I do read them and appreciate them. Your comments sometimes make me laugh and always put a smile on my face and I enjoy reading them. Thanks so much!

A trip down memory lane......past and present....

After flying a 58T for most of my day yesterday out of riverside then going to Whiteman Airport to fly SKY 9, I had seen the old Screaming Mimi sitting on the ramp at WHP with all of the other helicopters based at Whiteman Airport. That made me think of the past, how for many years while flying out of Van Nuys Airport, I had seen her sitting at the northwest corner in her orginal paint like the picture below, just sitting there, waiting for a new home and to fly again. It made me think of the TV Series and a few other shows in the 80's about flying helicopters. Airwolf was my all time favorite. Magnum PI was good too. Anyone remember Tales of the Gold Monkey? hahaha. Ahhh, Blue Thunder. So many cool helicopter shows. I was fortunate to have the bug to fly helicopters since I was a child but then to be able to watch so many shows with helicopters was even more inspiring to someday fly them.

The Screaming Mimi

After years of sitting at Van Nuys Airport, she was purchased by Summit Helicopters, painted up orange and now a working utility ship based out of Whiteman Airport.


One bad ass flying machine! Airwolf! Which by the way, when I was learning to fly, this machine was owned and operated along with Santini Air(the jetranger in Airwolf) out of VNY at Helinet where I was taking lessons. It was great to see her sitting in the hangar and sometimes on the ramp, without her movie paint. She is originally black with red stripes. Santini Air was in it's original paint scheme from the show. Santini Air stayed busy flying alot and Airwolf, the Bell 222 did a little less flying. She eventually was sold and went to a new home somewhere. How fortunate was I to grow up watching this show, loving helicopters, and then taking lessons from the people who owned her! It was inspirational and amazing.

Some links - Screaming Mimi - Riptide.....
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.tvacres.com/screaming_mimi.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.tvacres.com/helicopters_screaming.htm&h=278&w=379&sz=13&hl=en&start=1&um=1&tbnid=hHQy_7koxBrKuM:&tbnh=90&tbnw=123&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dscreaming%2Bmimi%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox%26rlz%3D1I7SKPB%26sa%3

More photos on the Screaming Mimi......
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.rotaryaction.com/images/riptide8.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.rotaryaction.com/pages/riptide.html&h=229&w=425&sz=22&hl=en&start=3&um=1&tbnid=6TWZ6szDhWo4dM:&tbnh=68&tbnw=126&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dscreaming%2Bmimi%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox%26rlz%3D1I7SKPB%26sa%3DN

Some show's of the 80's I grew up with......
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.retrojunk.com/img/art-images/airwolf01.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.retrojunk.com/details_articles/1742/&h=327&w=400&sz=19&hl=en&start=17&um=1&tbnid=PncbTxXJXdhsKM:&tbnh=101&tbnw=124&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dairwolf%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox%26rlz%3D1I7SKPB

Today I am back at VNY flying SKYFOX. We cruised the coast mostly for the morning show. It was fun and beautiful as always. When I first arrived at VNY, the sun was still coming up. It was one of those moments I should have taken a photo, but no camera. Helinet had ten ships on the ramp, impressive as always to see so many all painted up differently, and different models as well. The sun was lighting them up beautifully. A photo wouldn't have done them justice. It was like the typical start of every morning over here, all the machines anxiously waiting to go fly.

Marathon Lift Day!

Hard working ground crew after job number 2 setting light poles

The whole crew after the 2nd job

Chief Pilot Steve Bull hard at work.

The beautiful brilliant red paint on Engine 58

The Chopper-razzi watching the job and taking photos from the next roof top

Start of the day, morning sunrise with Engine 58

Afternoon job with 1231A (SKY 9) with it's amazing blue paint

An incredible photo from the Angel City Air crew.

Gary Lineberry landing the SKY 9 at sunset at Whiteman Airport.

The line of helicopters on the flight line and the tower in the background

are just a couple things that make this shot amazing.

Photo by Carston Bell.

From Riverside to Whiteman, from 58T to Astar today. Our company had three lift jobs the first part of my day. It was fun and exciting to go from job to job to job. We had the whole crew out in the field today. The word fun and exciting doesn't really describe it compared to how it actually was. It was the first time I had flown so many people in the helicopter. Afterall, it does seat a full troop load. I did the first job, our chief pilot did the second and I did the third job. After that I headed to Whiteman from Riverside to what felt like an inferno of hot air blowing on you once outside your car. I honestly do not think I have ever felt a wind that hot! The winds have been hot the past weeks, but nothing like this. I had been in the heat all day with the lift work so I figured nothing could be hotter than that. I was wrong. It seriously felt like a heat gun blowing on you. While I was preflighting my second helicopter of the day I couldn't help but notice how amazing the paint was on this helicopter. We were in the backup ship which has a new paint job on it. Well, not new, but recent in the past years and very well taken care of. It looked like a new car. I thought to myself, how cool I got to fly two beautiful machines today. Both Engine 58 which is bright red and 1231A(SKY 9 for the day) a vivid blue are the prettiest and most

brilliant of their colors.

DC Trip Pics from a couple of months ago

My friend David Bohrer and I in front of the West Wing.

David is the personal photographer for Dick Cheney.

My mom and I. Yes, it rained while we were there.

This guy was just too cool hanging out. I love ducks.

I couln't resist taking photos of these baby duckies. Soooo cute!

The money maker.

Pic inside the media room.

It was a short trip, just two days, but a great experience. My friend David Bohrer works at the White House so my mom and I got a private tour of the West Wing. Wish we could have stayed longer to see all the sites but had to get back to work.

By the way, my new favorite airline is Virgin America. There's just not enough room to type about all the great things about them. The online booking as well as the 800 number customer service was so easy and super thorough. They are fairly new, so not flying into too many places, but from now on before I travel, I will be looking to see if they fly there first. They are super modern. The plane is beautiful on the inside. So many gadgets, way more then jet blue. The safety briefing before flight you actually pay attention to because it's on the monitor in front of you in the seat and it's a funny cartoon. You can't help but watch and laugh. The most important thing....the customer service. The flight attendants and pilots are so much fun. They are super nice and very very attentive to everyone on board. The result of this modern jet and great crew was very happy passengers. I've never seen so many people in a good mood about traveling and enjoying their plane ride. The vibe onboard was great. Love ya Virgin America......please start to fly to more places soooooon.

A cool photo!

I love this photo. I got it from Helinet. It was for a movie shoot. This is not CG'd. This is real flying. The camera ship chasing the gunner ship. Pretty cool shot whoever took this photo.