NEW FIRE FIGHTING PLANE (2015)
The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources will be fighting fires from the sky with more force.The state fire program recently transitioned to a new aircraft that can extinguish a fire in record time.Jeff Weaver is a chief pilot for Aero Spray of Appleton, Minnesota, and he flies the FireBoss."The FireBoss aircrafts run close to $3 million apiece," Weaver said.The DNR has four FireBoss planes on contract at airports around the state. The aircrafts are manufactured in combination by FireBoss, LLC of South St. Paul and Texas-based Air Tracker, Inc. They are operated by Aero Spray of Appleton, Minnesota."This time of year in Minnesota after the snow melts, there is a lot of fuel on the ground that is susceptible to burning," Weaver said.He said he put out three fires this week. The biggest was a grass fire in Ostego that was fueled by wind, spreading to homes."I went down there and put four loads of water on the fire,” he said. "It's best suited when it's got a water source by the fire … We can drop in, pick up 800 gallons of water and bring it immediately back to the fire."According to manufactures, the FireBoss is popular in Europe, the Mediterranean and southern Canada. The state fire program recently transitioned from CL-215 planes to the new FireBoss in order to keep pace with changing technology.