As wildfires continue to burn through Southern California, destroying families’ lives and leveled homes, amphibious aircraft from Canada, also called Super Scoopers, have arrived to support the firefighting efforts. These specialized CL-415 aircraft are designed with forest firefighting in mind. Capable of scooping up water, mixing it with foam if needed, and directly spraying it onto the flames,.
As reported by The Washington Post, “Super Scoopers have some real advantages over older methods of fighting fires from the air, including helicopters equipped with buckets or air tankers”. Each Super Scooper can scoop an astonishing 1,600 gallons of water in a single pass, much more than helicopters using buckets.
More importantly, these planes do not necessarily need to land to refuel; they can scoop along the surface of nearby water bodies at about 160 km/h, refuel in a very short time, and be back in the fight.
The Super Scooper has a wingspan of 93 feet and a length of 65 feet, with a system that can mix water with foam concentrate to increase efficiency in firefighting. When the supply is running low, the pilot just skims the surface of the water to fill the tank in about 12 seconds by using a probe.
The other way is that the aircraft could be filled via hoses. Upon loading, it can fly into the affected region at speeds as high as 350 km/h, where the water could be all released at one time or dripped sequentially out of four doors to cover larger areas.
The county’s fire department has leased two Super Scoopers from the province of Quebec for 30 years. One was in service, while the other remains grounded after it collided with an illegal drone on a fire call this week, which left a “fist-sized” dent.
Thankfully, the pilots were not aware it occurred and landed safely. In an attempt to better boost the capability of its firefighters, SOPFEU, the Canadian nonprofit partnering with the Quebec government, announced its intention to make available to the city of Los Angeles two more CL-415s.
The deadly wildfires have taken at least 24 lives and destroyed more than 12,000 structures, leaving over 100,000 homeless. A number of Hollywood stars have lost their homes to the flames, with losses reportedly adding up to over $150 billion.
