Eclectic Arcania: The Death of Tanker 81

Thursday, October 9, 2014

The Death of Tanker 81

This past Tuesday a CAL FIRE S-2T tanker crashed while fighting the Dog Rock Fire on the western margin of Yosemite National Park within the park boundary near El Portal, CA. The crash killed 62 year-old Geoffrey "Craig" Hunt who piloted Tanker #81 based out of Hollister Air Attack Base in San Benito County serving San Benito-Monterey Unit (BEU). Below is a sequence of three images captured by an unknown (to me) photographer which I found on FirefighterCloseCalls.com's "Secret List". The fourth image down features a view of the crash from the perspective of up the hill from it. The final five images were captured from the same general area as the first three and theoretically might have been taken by the same person. They show the new wildfire started by the crash itself and the effort to suppress it by rotary-wing aircraft following the initial shutdown of all fixed-wing aircraft following a crash of such as is a standard operating procedure in such cases.

Note: as the viewer can see in the first image it appeas most of the left wing is not attached to the aircraft. According to an initial FAA document this crash is being preliminarily described as an aircraft crash caused by a wing striking a tree.