As a wildland firefighter for 35 years and an air tactical group supervisor for more than 10 years, I consider working with the PBY air tanker a highlight of my career.

However, the state of Washington’s decision not to contract for the PBY at Deer Park again next fire season is part of the growing national concern over using World War II vintage aircraft for high-stress, low-level work that they weren’t designed to do on a long term basis.

T-85 – the PBY based at Deer Park in recent summers – has had several chief pilots, among those, Eric Johnson, the most veteran. If you were fortunate enough to see the PBY work in the last 20 years, it was most likely Eric in the left seat. Dropping 1,500 gallons of water at tree top level, flying at 100 mph and hitting a target that is smoking or on fire and not hitting anyone on the ground is a monumental task in anyone’s book.

I have seen the national air tanker fleet reduced to a dozen or fewer aircraft since 2002, this down from 30-plus tankers in the early ‘90s. Whether this is through federal aviation standards, accidents or politics, wildland firefighting will become more dependent on air resources in the future as urbanization moves into the rural areas of the country.

Agencies have moved to more and larger helicopters carrying buckets capable of dropping up to 1,500 gallons of water attached to 100-foot cables. In an urban-wildland interface fire, working in and around homes adds another element of safety. Safety of firefighters, pilots and civilians is paramount in this environment. Private contract helicopters are also used, but typically on larger project fires of extended duration.

The numbers of national federally contracted fixed-wing firefighting aircraft of the 1980s and ‘90s may never be seen again. An aircraft specifically made for wildland firefighting is very expensive for the amount of time it is used each season. The Canadair CL-215, an aircraft similar to the PBY but built specifically for firefighting, can run $7,000 per day just to sit, then another $5,000 per hour air time. Agencies and states have been working on plans to share air resources, especially along borders and in urban wildland areas. This includes our Canadian partners in the British Columbia Forest Service that contracts from Conair, a fleet of aircraft that provide wildland firefighting protection to British Columbia, Alberta, Yukon and Alaska.

I know private enterprise will undoubtedly be a key in providing cost-effective, fixed-wing air resources for the future in wildland firefighting. Conair has developed in cooperation with a private “Single Engine Air Tanker (SEAT)” company, an 800-gallon air tanker on floats. These turbine aircraft can scoop or draft from very small bodies of water and drop with high precision on initial attack fires.

I believe the key to urban wildland firefighting is “close-in air support,” hitting them while they are small and manageable. Losing trees and vegetation that will grow back and are part of a sustainable ecosystem is only natural. Losing lives, homes and infrastructure is costly and is unacceptable in today’s political environment. The firefighting agencies of the Pacific Northwest are committed to finding cost-effective and efficient solutions to aerial firefighting for the 21st century.