HELENA — You have probably first heard, then seen, air tankers fly through the Big Sky to fight wildfires, and this fire season, planes at the tanker base in Helena have been busy.
Learn more about air tanker crews in Montana:
“I love flying in Montana. This is where I want to be, this is where I try to get if I can,” said Joshua Kryzsko, a C-130 firefighting pilot.
It’s where Kryzsko wants to be because he gets to protect his community.
“Just being in my home state, it feels really good, it feels important helping out the locals,” said Kryzsko.
He has flown over 200 hours across the country fighting fires this season, and now he is putting his skills to work in the Treasure State on fires like the Windy Rock Fire by Avon and the West Fork Fire by West Yellowstone.
“Well, the C-130, in my opinion, is one of the better platforms for fighting wildfires," Kryzsko says. “We carry 4,000 gallons of retardant on it.”
That much retardant requires a big plane to carry it, like the one Kryzsko flies or the well-known DC-10.
Helena is specially equipped to accommodate these large tanker planes.
The Forest Service tanker base has the infrastructure and retardant resources they need.
Many people think that red powder is dumped directly on the fire, but Kryzsko says that’s a misconception.
“That’s not the case, we actually circumference the wildfire and our whole goal is to buy the firefighters on the ground time to fight the wildfire,” said Kryzsko.
Wildfire fighting is all about teamwork, aerial resources supporting ground crews, something Kryzsko continues to emphasize in his decade of wildfire flying.
He says, “I am passionate about aviation, I am passionate about wildfires, and I like the down and dirty type of flying.”
Although many air tankers are at the forest service base right now, they can fly off to other missions on a moment’s notice. Missions as far away as Australia and Chile.
