WEBVTT

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name is Lieutenant Colonel Chris petty .

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The operation were supporting is a

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Department of Defense support mission

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helping out Fort Carson who are

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battling a approximately 40,000 acre

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blaze . 40 miles southeast of Fort

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Carson on opinion canyon maneuver site

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training area Fire has been going on

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for 4.5 to 5 days . This will actually

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be day four of our support to that fire .

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The speculation right now is a

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lightning strike . But that's just what

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I read in the press . I've been on the

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fire for two days personally . I've

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been flying a black hawk and dropping

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water out of the black hawk bucket and

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just daisy chaining in and out dropping

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500 gallons at a time . It's an

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external load for a Blackhawk and

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chinook . You're scooping water with a

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bucket hanging 40 ft 50 ft below the

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aircraft . You're scooping water out of

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a river and uh flying approximately a

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mile to the drop site and trying to

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drop the water on the fire line where

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the ground commander , the incident

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commander tells you to drop in to help

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these guys on the ground . The black

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hawk is dipping approximately 500

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gallons and the chinook is dipping

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approximately 2000 gallons on a big

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fire like this . Sometimes it feels

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like you're not doing much , but if you

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look at certain areas that they're

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trying to isolate you really , you

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really are helping the ground commander

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number one hazard for aircrews is your

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operating within 5% of your max power

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in the black Hawk . I know the chinooks

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are not as power limited but the

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Blackhawks are operating right at the

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power margin to pick up that full

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bucket of water with these high

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temperatures . So that's probably our

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number one hazard . Number two

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hazardous other aircraft in the area ,

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you know , good situational awareness .

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Uh Number three hazard is actually the

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fire itself , you know , emergency

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landing areas , just situational

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awareness on where the fire is moving

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the smoke , other tankers coming in and

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doing their drops . So you know , there

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are some hazards , but all all

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manageable by Cruz with good

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situational awareness . We're actually

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supporting Department of Defense out of

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Fort Carson . Uh but on the ground

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we're actually working with the uh

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National Forest Service , Wild Land

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Fire incident Commander . Yeah , as far

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as I know , it's limited right now to

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Colorado Army National Guard Aviation .

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And uh we will have 18 people total on

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the site today as crew members and one

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flight ops specialist down there

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tracking aircraft to make calls back

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here . We're actually working the fire

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from because they pretty much only do

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daytime operations when they fight fire .

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So we're actually working the fire from

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about nine o'clock in the morning until

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1500 in the evening . We were working

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till 17 , I'm sorry 1920 but we're

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trying to provide them more aircraft .

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Uh you know fighting the fire for a six

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hour time block . This is a mixed force

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of Colorado Army National Guard

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Aviation . So different units make up

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this little task force today . We've

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got one black , we've got actually uh

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four Blackhawks and one should look

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that will be on the fire today . Most

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of those aircraft will be from second

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Battalion one , 35th Aviation . Wild

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land fires . Yeah yeah they have an

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incident command set up , they do this

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for a living , they're pretty good at

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it . Uh So you're talking to a king air

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circling overhead , he's managing the

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air assets coming into the fire . So

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he's actually telling you where to drop

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and what to do . You're talking to the

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ground commander whose they'll they'll

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pass you off to certain sections of the

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fire if they want you to fight and

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support . You know ? The other day

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there was a group of 40 people on the

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ground fighting a finger of the fire .

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And we were talking directly to them as

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we flew in and make drops exactly where

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they wanted us to drop . So it's a

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pretty it's pretty interesting

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operation . The four air controller

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doesn't , but the incident commander on

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the ground does . He'll have different

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fire sections , working areas of the

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fire and uh you'll push their frequency ,

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you'll talk to them and make the drops

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where they want you to drop in their

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section . Yeah there's uh there's at

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least one air tanker that we saw .

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Making drops the other day . I don't

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know what totally committed to it