by Roberto Gentilli
JP4 Mensile di Aeronautica
Air Tractor is no stranger to fighting forest fires in Italy. There are three airplanes operating already in Basilicata since 2001 having flown almost 500 hours.
But the floatplane version of it, the Air Tractor 802F Fire Boss introduced at the Salon de Paris in 2003 is new to Italy, based at the Oristano Fenosu airport.
Air Tractor from Olney, Texas has been building agricultural airplanes since 1970. The AT-802 and the fire fighter version, the AT-802F were introduced in 1993 with a wingspan of 59.25 feet, a wing area of 401 square feet, an empty weight of 7,050 pounds and a gross weight of 16,000 pounds. It is the largest single engine airplane in service, equipped with the PTA-67AG with 1,350 hp. Over 200 units have been delivered around the world.
Recently, the amphibious floats version was introduced in Italy; the main customer is the Compañía General de Incendios S.A. (CEGISA) from Spain, in partnership with Conair of Canada. The dealer for Air Tractor and Fire Boss in Europe is Avialsa from Valencia, Spain.
The Fire Boss is a design of Wipaire, Inc. of Saint Paul, Minnesota. Equipped with a Pilot Interface System, the patented AT-802F fire gate allows the pilot to select the coverage level, amount to be dropped and ground speed. The computer makes continuous adjustments to deliver coverage levels with precision, even in conditions of changing airplane airspeeds and turbulence.
The advantage of employing the Fire Boss as a fast, agile single engine air tanker is the rapid response to the fire. A fundamental aspect of forest fire fighting is to attack the source of the fire to prevent the spread that makes it difficult to put out once fully developed, even with larger aircraft.
Early results in Spain and Canada with the Fire Boss show a noticeable improvement compared to the standard spring steel gear AT-802.
The Fire Boss has the advantage of combining the initial attack with fire retardant followed by subsequent ones with water than can be loaded at a nearby lake or sea. The retardant can be mixed with the water while in flight.
The Fire Boss can be loaded initially with 660 gallons of water mixed with 78 gallons of FireTrol 931 at a speed of 145 knots at a fuel burn of 75 gallons per hour that allows a three-hour endurance with the standard 254-gallon fuel tank. The useful load goes up to 800 gallons as the fuel load decreases.
The numbers are a lot smaller than the Bombardier CL-415, obviously, that carries 1,650 gallons of water and 1,496 pounds of fire retardant or the Beriev Be-200 that carries 3,150 gallons of water and 350 gallons of retardant.
The advantage of the Fire Boss is that it comes at a fraction of the price of the CL-415 scooping aircraft; multiple Fire Bosses can deliver more water at a much lower cost.
With the ability to work as a land-based aircraft or a scooper, the Fire Boss can drop an initial load of retardant then remain close to the fire scooping water from a nearby lake. This ability is particularly useful when combined with additional land-based aircraft and is easy to achieve on a peninsula like Italy.
The Autonomous Region of Sardegna has signed a contract with Avialsa of Valencia, Spain for an early warning, detection and extinction of forest and range fires with the use of two Air Tractor AT-802Fs. Avialsa is represented in Italy by SP&A Soluzioni Per l’Ambiente and supported by Interfly whose president is Marco Balzarini, an air taxi operator based in Linate and Parma operating two Beechcraft 200 King Airs, a Citation I and a Citation Jet III.
The Fenosu base is conveniently located on the west side of Sardegna to facilitate the fire fighting efforts on that side of the island.
The airplanes based there are sitting at ready alert and during times of high alert they patrol the region to fight the fires right at the onset. They complement the CL-415 and Erickson Sky Crane S-64 on large fires.
Normally, the aircraft operate with a load of water mixed with Fire-Trol 931 a product of Biogema di Aix of Provence under license of FireTrol Holding of Phoenix, Arizona.
FireTrol is an ammonia polyphosphate-based product mixed with corrosion inhibitor, thickening and coloring agents and has the advantage of being a liquid. FireFoam103B mixed with water and has the property of reducing the surface tension of the water allowing it to drop on the fire in a compact form while the foam has the properties of absorbing the heat energy of the fire. The usage ratio of water alone and water mixed with retardant is about 4:1. FireTrol is distributed in Italy by SP&A, srl.
The pilot can select the mixing ratio of water and retardant as well as the area to by applied, according to the size of the fire. The cruise speed of the AT-802F is over 140 knots reducing the ferry and response times.
The Sardegna Region summer fire season cost 80 million euros and employs 10,000 men, 15 aircraft, a vast network of detection, early warning ground support and an education campaign in the form of instruction pamphlets sent to local citizens. Several government agencies are in charge of coordinating the activities through the Civil Protection Agency. Per a letter of agreement, the different civil agencies provide the coordination of aircraft and ground support that are available for fire response.
For the 2006 fire season, in addition to the Fire Boss, an AB212 helicopter was brought in with a team of nine firefighters with the objective of relocating the personnel directly to the fire while coordinating the use of the three Canadair CL-415s and both Skycrane S-64s.
In the last few years, the number of fires has remained constant at about 3000 events, but the acreage damaged by fires was reduced by half in the last five years as a statement of efficiency by using aircraft.
The three CL-415s and two Skycrane S-64 helicopters are based at Olbia and Villasalto, while the others are spread around Farcana, Sorgono and Lanusei in the northwest; Vilasalto and Pula in the Cagliari region, Marganai, Santa Maria and Fenosu in the Oristano region and Thiesi, Ala dei Sardi and Anela in the Sasaresse region.
The two Fire Bosses are the primary attack source because of the short response time; from July 3 they are primarily employed to extinguish the start of the fires during the first two hours without the support of the other aircraft.
The use of aircraft has resulted in a new strategy; employing them as the fire grows in size and out of reach of the ground personnel, escalating all the way to a massive attack that has taken up to 12 drops an hour with aircraft flying tandem formation.
Employing the Fire Boss as a patrol aircraft can be costly, but has been validated by Avialsa in Spain and Portugal.
From July 3 through August 31, both aircraft, registration EC-JLC and EC-JQM have flown a little over 134 hours for 54 missions with a maximum of eight missions for one day on August 23.
The airplanes executed 278 foam drops, 64 retardant drops and 144 water drops with a maximum of 10 foam drops and 19 water drops during two sorties that lasted 4 hours and 31 minutes on July 15.