Fire Fighting Choppers

I know many of you do not do Facebook, I just posted this on my Facebook page. If you want to see more of the photos I shot this morning, they are there,

Billings Flight Services of Billings, Montana has four CH47 Chinook helicopters in Durango fighting the 416 fire.
[billingsflyingservice.com]

This morning, Mike Strasser, one of the pilots, and his wife Stefan gave me a tour of their operations at the Durango Air Port. Mike is also an incredible artist and he and Stefan produce a line of aviation comic books and other aviation goodies. Take a look, some pretty cool stuff.
[www.chickenwingscomics.com]

The CH47 Chinook helicopter was originally built for the military both the US military and our allies by Boeing-Vertol. One of the Billing's CH47s was acquired from the Australian Air Force. All the Billing's CH47s have been upgraded with more powerful jet engines, up-to-date electronics and brought up same standards as new CH47s.
Billings uses two systems for fighting fires, a traditional water bucket that is very useful for dropping a lot of water on a small area. They also use a siphon and tank system where the helicopter siphons water from ponds, lakes, etc. into a large tank inside the CH47, the same siphon tubes are used to drop large amounts of water on the fire. What a bunch of great folks who are doing a very dangerous job to protect us from fires. Thanks guys for saving Durango.





Mike Strasser, one of the CH47 pilots and yours truly in front of the water bucket. It is larger than I thought.


The bubble window gives the pilot great visibility in almost all directions.