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News chopper causes waveoffs of fire retardant drop
By JOSEPH B. FRAZIER
Associated Press Writer
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) -- A TV news helicopter covering a retardant drop on a wildfire near The Dalles violated fire flight regulations, causing two retardant runs to be waved off and delaying the third, final attempt to drop the chemical, an Oregon Department of Forestry official said Tuesday.
Jim Ziobro, state aviation specialist and safety officer for the agency, said the pilot for Portland station KGW had been briefed on the rules shortly before entering the fire zone.
He said a report of Friday's incident was being faxed Tuesday to the Federal Aviation Administration.
Ziobro said helicopter pilots must remain in radio contact and stay at least 500 feet above the highest aircraft.
"He didn't do that," Ziobro said, adding that at times the helicopter was under the plane trying to make the drop.
Firefighters said the tankers were notified of the helicopter's presence by people on the ground. Ziobro said the helicopter pilot did not have the required frequencies needed stay in contact with fire managers.
He said other media aircraft covering the fire caused no problems.
"They followed the rules and they got what they needed," he said.
The KGW pilot, Daron Larsen, was angered by the accusations. Larsen said he was at roughly the same altitude as the aerial firefighters and would have moved higher if he had been told.
He said there was no temporary flight restriction in place when he arrived, and, without one, he has the same right to the airspace as the fire crews.
"I did not break any rules; I want to make that 100 percent clear," said Larsen, who said he has been flying news helicopters for eight years, seven of them in Seattle.
Rod Gramer, KGW's executive news director, said fire officials had called the station with airspace restrictions and frequencies, but the helicopter already was en route home by the time it re-entered radio range. He questioned why fire managers would have called the station if the pilot had been briefed.
"I can guarantee you the pilot is responsible," Gramer said.
Ziobro said civilian aircraft, not just news helicopters, frequently show up over forest fires. He said some pilots don't realize that a loaded tanker is a heavy, lumbering plane that cannot maneuver easily and that the airspace over a retardant drop zone can be crowded with other firefighting aircraft and even smoke jumpers.
"Midair collisions are not forgiving," he said. "Nobody walks away from a midair crash."
The incident near The Dalles was not an isolated one.
Rich Webster an air tactical supervisor who flies ahead of tankers over a wildfire, said he couldn't believe what he saw during a wildfire in southern Oregon's Applegate Valley on July 22.
"Everywhere you looked there were six, seven little hang gliders and ultra lights," he said. "It was like moths attracted to a flame," he told the Medford Mail Tribune newspaper.
He said that retardant drop was delayed until the civilian craft were shooed out of the area. The same thing happened June 10 with a news helicopter at a fire near Gold Hill.
Webster said aircraft 12 nautical miles out from a fire zone must call for clearance. If granted, it must call again at seven miles.
"Someone is going to be drastically hurt if it continues," Phil Hufstader, the Medford air tanker base manager for the Oregon Department of Forestry, told the Mail Tribune.
He said he has about 11 minutes from when a call comes in to get planes in the air, nowhere near enough time to notify all civilian airstrips in the region, and that civilian pilots simply should stay away.
He said there are lots of new pilots. "They are taking 'looky-looks' and getting right square in the middle of the fire. It's causing a real safety problem for us."
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Don't touch my junk!!
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They get in the way while they're "embedded" in warzones, now they're impeding firebombers!? They think they're so effing important, but they're just whores. 
