Fire Fighting

Fire Fighting Services

BlanchAir Pty Ltd and Caloundra Helicopter Centre have a Garlick TH1-F medium lift helicopter (Bell 204B), VH-UHD, which is available for fire control services.

No expense has been spared to ensure this aircraft is as capable as any medium category helicopter on the fire-ground.

VH-UHD is currently registered for call-as-needed with NSW RFS as Helitack 280.

The owner of the helicopter is a licensed aircraft maintenance engineer and will be accompanying the aircraft whenever it’s tasked, with a dedicated maintenance support vehicle equipped with tools and spares.

One advantage of this helicopter over others of the UH-1B stable is its increased fuel capacity. UHD being an F model has an extra 50 minutes of endurance allowing us to stay on the fire ground for up to 2.5 hours per sortie.

Specifications

Honeywell T53-L13B, 1400 SHP turbine engine.
Bell 205 main rotor.
Bell 212 intermediate gearbox.
Composite tail rotor blades.
BLR Fast-Fin and strakes
Siren loud hailer.
Oscillating caution approach lights
Swath camera with DVR and GPS input allowing us to record video footage of each drop with GPS position
Spidertracks web based real time tracking system.

Fire-Fighting mission equipment is comprised of two brand new Simplex F.A.S.T buckets of 1325 litre capacity.