Don’t misunderstand, it’s not all drugery; David-Allison-Kate-Admiral Terry at Malaga, 2010.
This time next week the European Aerial Firefighting Conference will be underway in Aix en Provence in southern France. Tangent Link the conference organizers have advised me there are over 23 countries represented with over 250 delegates participating.
This conference will include a wide range of aircraft participating in an aerial fire fighting display in simulated wildfire scenarios. Aircraft in live flying demonstrations will include Conair’s developed Dash 8 bomber, CL415s, Turbine Fire Cats (operated by Securite Civile), Fire Boss and Airtractor 802 operated by Inaer, and Eurocopter will demonstrate a Super Puma (EC225) and a B3 Squirrel.
Our company BioCentral Laboratories Ltd is a part sponsor of the conference and we will be dropping BlazeTamer380 for the first time in Europe as part of our European launch. As BlazeTamer380 mixes readily in all water types including seawater, the Mediterranean region seems a logical fit where so many Canadairs, Bierev and Erickson aircraft can access this water for aerial firefighting.
I am co-chairing the conference and I will be challenging delegates to look at the total delivery performance of aerial firefighting and what factors come together to achieve this success.
I hope to catch up with Walt Darran and Jerome Laval there and if possible we will try and conduct a round table on Jerome’s model for tactical decision making for aerail fire attack. Tony Morris will be collating our collective thoughts of the conference upon our return
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Time went really fast..
Well organized, good presentations.
I’m hoping(and suggested to Tangent Link) “Group Discussions” will be part of the next event so people(preferably small groups..10 max?) can actually discuss, share and debate under the supervision of a moderator.
This (small but important)industry is facing incredible challenges for the next fire seasons.. Budgets decreasing, fires increasing, fleet reduced and aging…
Efficient Initial Attack(Quality of dispatching, adapted aerial means, coordinated effort with ground, etc) will define the success of Air Ops in aerial fire fighting. We can’t afford to miss the IA phase.
Jerome