dispatch

DISPATCH
THE
Meanwhile, south of the border:
By Ray Horton
This fire season got off to a great start in the U.S. with
the 2 USFS contracted RJ’s heading out in late May.
Tanker 160 went north to Alaska while T161 deployed to southern California. By the end
of June, Tankers 162 and 163 had been added to the mix, picked up by the USFS under
Call-When-Needed (CWN) contracts.
ISSUE #27
To date, Aero-Flite tankers and crew have remained primarily in the west and mid-west,
working fires in Alaska, California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming and
Colorado. Tanker 160 returned to the lower 48 after spending almost 2 months supporting the activity in Alaska alongside Conair’s 2 Alaska based Convair 580’s.
July 2015
A hot, dry summer for British Columbia
As of late, one RJ has seen a great deal of action in the parched forests of northern
California while the other 3 aircraft and crew continue the fight against numerous wildfires plaguing Washington, Oregon and Idaho.
Proven last year throughout the U.S. and again this past winter in Australia, the RJ85
continues to be a very worthy and capable component of the next generation airtanker
fleet. Its retardant delivery system, speed and handling characteristics all combine to
make this aircraft an excellent airtanker. Congratulations and many thanks to the
engineering, production and maintenance crews who have dedicated these past 4+
years to design, build and transform the RJ85 into such a successful firefighting aircraft!
I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that whenever I travel to a base where Conair
CV580’s have been in the past, I continue to hear the praise and appreciation tanker
base personnel have for our crews and our aircraft. Such comments continue to verify
the great people within our organization and the tremendous ambassadors you are for
Conair. I am both proud and fortunate to work with you all!
- Ray
Convair 44 actioning The West Kelowna, Shelter Cove
wildfire on July 21st
July 21st - The West Kelowna, Shelter Cove wildfire
August 5th: The fire situation in B.C. remains a
major concern as crews battle 140 fires across
the province – 36 of them, human caused.
There have been a total of 1,445 fires so far this
year in BC (as of August 10th).
Our newest large wildfire, Wood Lake
(formerly West Harrison FSR), is estimated at
1325 hectares as of August 10th; it is now 40%
contained.
Congratulations to our Conair calendar contest winner for July;
photo taken near Manning, Alberta.
Email sent to Conair on July 2nd, 2015:
Other active wildfires of note: Boulder Creek,
Cougar Creek and Elaho. For more information,
please visit:
http://engage.gov.bc.ca/bcwildfire/
Good evening ! I am an old acquaintance of Captain Ray Horton, and I just wanted to
pass along to Conair my sincere thanks for your prompt attack on the Cedar. (Cassidy
Airport area, south of Nanaimo) fire this evening.
We were just down the road at Michael Lake and I must say I was becoming concerned
until I saw the familiar tankers! THANK YOU again. Please do pass on my sincerest
thanks to this evening’s crews.
July 21st Shelter Cove wildfire
June 24th Harrison Hot Springs wildfire
Kindest regards...
Capt. Rick Zimmerman,
Manager, Safety Investigations,
Jazz Aviation LP
We welcome your suggestions, story content or pictures for future publications of The Conair Dispatch.
Please forward to: Joanne Goodridge, Newsletter Editor by email at: jgoodridge@conair.ca
CONAIR GROUP INC. | 1510 Tower Street, Abbotsford, BC, Canada V2T 6H5 | c o n a i r.c a
Wood Lake wildfire taken on the evening of August 2nd
by a local resident
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France’s Q-400 celebrates its 10th anniversary
Junior Forest Rangers...
Duffles delight, thanks to Conair
Below is an excerpt of a letter that Conair France received from Victor Devouge,
Chef du BMA, regarding the 10th anniversary celebration of the Q-400 in
Marignane, France.
By Cliff Henderson
Partnerships are a big part of the JFR program – they
include host community crews, work projects and
educational tours. Generally all of our crews rave
about the cool tour of the tanker base that they took
and how huge the planes are. Our contract tanker
staff are always generous with their time and happily
share their aerial fire fighting knowledge and experiences with the JFR crews.
“Being questioned by some people when it arrived at the BASC, the Dash 8 Q-400 quickly
assumed its position and found its place amongst other Sécurité Civile aircraft, while we
could acknowledge its qualities.
In particular, for instance:
- Its speed (cruising speed 650 km/h, Milan is the fastest bird flown by the BASC)
- Its payload capacity (with a 10,000 liter tank, it can spread a high efficient retardant
barrier)
- Its reliability (with 95 % operational availability, it provides satisfaction, both to BASC
technical staff and flight crews and also to our firefighting partners)
- Finally, its versatility, which makes the Dash 8 an instrument at the service du Ministère
de l’Intérieur as well as the French state.
This year, Conair Aerial Firefighting took their partnership one step further though and
helped outfit the crews. Conair
provided duffle bags to each of
the leaders and members on all
eleven crews! They were very
well received with lots of “awesome” and “thanks so much”
comments.
In 10 years of good service, the Dash 8 Q-400 has added multiple various missions in far
away places, destinations for instance: Haiti, Guinea, Turkey, Algeria, Albania, ... some
destinations were media covered, others more discrete and out of the public limelight.
But they were no less important.
Our crews have finished training, packed up their
new duffles and headed out to their field locations for
the summer. Look for them at a tanker base near you.
Of course, we cannot talk of the Dash 8 without looking at the missions at la Réunion
Island that is now a regular annual occurrence for the SOFT and Dash 8 pilots. On this
subject, I want to welcome the “Le Dash 8 à La Réunion “ publication and congratulate
its author for the text and the beautiful pictures.
To Conair, we thank you, not only for your continued
partnership and generous donation to the JFR
program, but for your continued support of our firefighting operations in Alberta.
Safety Message of the month
By Buck Page
We all encounter hazards and correct them every day. Most of them are minor and
require little effort, such as when you blew on your coffee to ensure it wasn’t too hot
before sipping, or when you looked through the window in the door before opening it.
Occasionally, we encounter more significant hazards that take some extra effort to make
safe, like moving a power cord out of a walkway, seeing a damaged ladder on the hangar
floor, or finding a leaking chemical.
Our Safety Management System (SMS) has tools for
us to use to report these hazards and help ensure
they have been addressed, and also to help us
benefit from the lessons we can learn from them to
prevent future exposure.
•
Hazard Report forms are available in all
hangars at YXX
•
Aerostudies has a “Safety Reports (SMS)”
tool that can be used to report hazards (and
incidents)
•
Your Occupational Safety & Health (OSH) and
Pilot Safety Committee (PSC) representatives
and Safety Manager are always available to
discuss hazards and mitigations
Not taking advantage of the opportunity to correct and report hazards means other
people are likely to encounter them. Our job as proud professionals:
See A Hazard Fix A Hazard (and/or) Report A Hazard
Thanks for doing your part!
BUCK PAGE CRSP, CPP
Safety Manager
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Milan is a French eagle. But for the BASC
pilots, firefighters and air traffic controllers,
it is the dash 8 Q-400 radio call sign. You can
see it today proudly decorating the Dash 8’s
tail. It symbolizes power, span and beauty
of this plane, as well as agility of its pilots.
Today, beyond their skill, I wish to recognize
their engagement to realize difficult missions,
in sometime very short delays. Receive my
congratulations and my gratefulness in what
you accomplish every day, with the BMA and BASC support.”
If you would like to have a look through the “Le Dash 8 à La Réunion“ book, please
see Joanne - there is a copy at Reception.
Conair Pilot Fatigue study project approved
•
By Jeff Berry
•
Conair has partnered with two academic institutions, UBC Okanagan and Camosun
College and one industrial partner, Latitude Systems Inc. and is proud to announce a
recently approved 2 year Consortium for Aerospace Research and Innovation in Canada
(CARIC), project intended to have a closer look at pilot fatigue.
•
Fatigue management is critical to ensure safety of flight. The current understanding of
fatigue and the measurement of contributing factors and the regulatory regime are all
based largely on 705 (airline) operations.
The unique nature of our operations needs to be considered and a tailored fatigue
management system needs to be developed to enable the management of the “hazards”
associated with fatigue as part of our existing Safety Management System (SMS).
We will sample single and dual pilot cockpit
environments.
We will measure the fatigue in water skimming
and land based operations.
We will develop a program that can be used
within our Safety Management System to
provide a tailored fatigue management.
More information will be rolling out as the academic
institutions start their research process.
You may even be part of a visit with one of the
research teams at an active tanker base during the
remainder of this season.
Rest requirements, as dictated by the current and proposed fatigue management regulations, which are based on the current generalized understanding of fatigue in aviation:
•
•
•
•
•
Manages fatigue based on inadequate calendar schedule.
Occurs often in the first few days of flying activity, after periods of non-flying alert .
Forces rest, on rested pilots.
Takes into consideration negative impact on crew currency.
If not watched, can permit flight by fatigued pilots.
This project will focus on quantifying the fatigue component associated with the workload of an airtanker pilot in the course of his/her duties. This study will span multiple
pilots in multiple aircraft types.
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