Aaron headed to Ontario to battle the wildfires in late May and they raged on clear into early August.  They timed out twice and did about 300 hours in the S61 during that time frame.  Almost daily they did 8 hours (eight and skate as they say).  We never planned to be up there for that long, but whatever pays the bills and wherever they can be of assistance, then that is where we go! 

After such a long and arduous season that started so early, we didn’t really think we would have much gas left in the tank to do much more that year, but were able to get a late Forest Service carding in Sacramento in mid August, so we took advantage of it with both the S61 and the Super Puma…just incase they needed help later on.  After 2 days of carding we started looking at the map of where we wanted to stage the machines in hopes of getting picked up on a fire and before the ink was dry on our carding sheets the phone call came in for N448JS.  As I stated earlier, we were in Sacramento, California for the carding process and when the call came in, they requested the aircraft launch to Tallahassee.  Aaron scratched his head and said I’m sorry, I don’t think I have heard of Tallahassee, California.  Their response was “No, Tallahassee, Florida!”  The Super Puma got called a few hours later to head to Texas. So without further delay, they planned their route, we got the fuel truck and the service van headed in the right direction and off we went.  It would take 3 days for both the fuel trailer and service van to arrive.  The helicopter would overnight along route and make it the next day.  

Once we arrived we managed to get hooked up with our Forest Service Manager and get to the proper location on the forest.  We were there just long enough for the fuel trailer and service van to arrive before a hurricane was headed right for us.  Oh Florida, you are silly.  Without taking any chances, they said, you guys better head west, so we are sending you to Wiggins, MS to stage out of there for a while.  I think we figured we would be there for about a week or less as it didn’t seem like much was happening on the fire front, but we got to Wiggins on August 23rd and didn’t leave until mid November.  Yes, you read that correctly, late August until mid November taking up residence at the local Hampton Inn in Wiggins, Mississippi.  We stayed so long that I had to get a better mattress pad at the hotel!  The helicopter stayed on for about another month with the Forest Service getting called to Tennessee and Kentucky.  Holy Cannoli.  What a season to remember!