Tanker seattle times

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Instead they tore the neighborhood apart. Jon Talton. People or profit? In addition, 34 helicopters — including National Guard Blackhawks and Chinooks — were deployed Friday across Washington state, flying almost nonstop from temporary pads in fields much closer to the fires.

Show caption. The aerial tankers at Moses Lake fill up there with fire retardant and fly into their assigned fire zones. About a quarter of a mile ahead in a small lead plane, an experienced fire manager is in radio contact with firefighters on the ground and with a tanker crew.

The lead plane — typically a Beechcraft King Air turboprop or a Cessna Citation business jet — shows the tanker where it wants to begin dropping retardant and where to stop, often by injecting a little oil into the engine to emit a smoke trail as it moves along the desired line. The lead plane makes a run through in advance and will bring in the tanker only if visibility is good and the pilot sees a good entry point and safe exit point.

Each tanker has a single crew. Eight hours is the maximum flying time allowed per day, with a mandatory two days off every two weeks. Air Force spokeswoman Capt. Making sure that no foreign object debris makes its way onto a finished airplane is the responsibility of every mechanic who works on the plane but also of the quality inspectors, whose job is to do a final check on any area of an airplane before it is closed up. What seems to be a serious lapse in FOD control comes as Boeing says it intends to cut almost 1, quality inspectors jobs over the next two years.

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