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Wow Greg! What an experience!

Glad to hear your mom and stepdad's home has survived this tragedy currently unfolding in Colorado.

(...though my heart goes out to those in that area who weren't as lucky, and to the family and friends of the crew of one of those C130s which crashed yesterday)


Yeah, I just heard about that, what a shame!!! I'm also torn between anger that we aren't using aircraft like the converted 747 (that can dump 20,000 gallons in ONE shot) or DC10's that also can at least double the C130's payload, and realizing the reality of handling large aircraft like that in a mountainous scenario where the updrafts and downdrafts caused by the fires would be a nightmare for pilots. But when I hear that our firefighting aircraft fleet is almost ZILCH nationwide, while hearing the Secretary of the Interior also saying we have ample airborne resources wants to make my yell, "Oh really, tell that to the over 700 homeowners who have lost homes in a matter of weeks here because of these fires. But the reality is that the Waldo fire jumped the last canyon between the wilderness areas and the Springs in something like 8 minutes I believe, or some ridiculously fast number, and getting any large aircraft on scene in that kind of time would have been too little, too late. It was an inferno, and with 346 homes all burning within a very very short time was beyond what ANY firefighting force could deal with, so the fact that it didn't take out ALL of western Colorado Springs (given how close homes are here and with the abundance of nice ripe-for-burning pine there) is a testament to their heroism.