Tanker 99. The retardant tanks fill the space in her bomb bay, circa 1985.
We are helpless, wafting in and out of the rising column of smoke, desperately searching for the Pumper crew below;
Do you see them on your side? There along this flank...do you see the
Heuy?
Every one talking at once on the Guard UHF:
Engine crew in trouble-divert all air tankers to this fire, all engine crews pull back.
To the air attack circling above the fast moving flank;
"Do you see them; any one see them?"
A voice fringed with panic slices through the radio chatter..." We can't breath... we are making a run for it..."
A long second of silence.
The cockpit is stifling, the air we are breathing tastes like charcoal, our eyes scratchy and irritated by the ash floating through the air vents. We are very low. Turning tightly, flaps at 15 degrees, airspeed at 135 knots, we are heading back into the smoke.
They have to be here.
A new voice
"We hear you overhead..."
The B-17 bucked, the yoke slamming into my wrist as the load of retardant
salvoes from her belly tanks even as the fire boss is yelling "Drop damn-it drop!-"
A S2F thundering through our wake adds his load to the pink mist drifting into the roaring smoke below, two
Heuys, Bambi buckets overflowing with water are waiting for us to clear. A second S2F arrives over the fire and a DC-4 advises he is 5 minutes out.
But it is over.
Fate has sealed the books.
Three lives are lost, the fourth firefighter would succumb to his burns several days later.
The fire was not finished, even as we headed back for another load of retardant an S2F air tanker lay shattered and burning on the side of a hill, the pilot, while attempting to save these lives, lost his own.
Tanker 99, before her conversion to a wild land firefighter, endured a nuke and 20 some odd years of weather exposure at the Yukka flats testing grounds in Nevada. Deemed safe by the air force she was sold to a civilian contractor, who, rumor has it, replaced the fabric surfaces, fired her up and flew her to her new home for a major overhaul. I was relieved when I was assigned to the company's PB1W (Navy B-17) T-34. Although 99 didn't glow in the dark, I remained skeptical, although it turned out, not skeptical enough to not fly her when the opportunity arose.
