THE winter season was officialy opened by the Letaba Fire Protection Association (LFPA) at the Mooketsi runway at ZZ2 to accept an 802AT Fire Fighting Aircraft.

“The LFPA monitored the devastating fires in Knysna last year and realized that there may in the future be a need to bring in extra resources to combat disastrous fires especially where communities are involved,” Trevor Phillips, chairperson of both the LFPA and the chairperson of the Limpopo Umbrella Fire Protection Association said.

One of these resources could be the purpose built Air tractor 802. A 3000L aircraft with a speed that can get to a disastrous fire in under an hour to assist with the fire fighting efforts. But one of the problems that the LFPA encountered was the relative unavailability of runways long enough and with enough water supply to host such an aircraft.

The LFPA approached ZZ2 to modify their runway, which had the minimum length of 1.4km and was able to supply the refilling capacity of 3000L in under 2 minutes to the aircraft. The project was undertaken and on Thursday, May 31 they were able to train the bomber loaders to refill the 802 in under 2 minutes. “Unfortunately there are only 4 of these 802’s in the country and the cost of hosting one at the LFPA is prohibitively high under the current budgets.

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The Lowveld and Escarpment Fire Protection Association has kindly leant us this aircraft for the day. We in Limpopo, may therefore only have availability of one of these aircraft in very extreme circumstances and noting that Limpopo is the last province to get high fire danger with the passing fronts and thus resources are otherwise engaged in firefighting efforts to the south of us before our weather becomes extreme,” Phillips said during the function.

The LFPA has for the past number of years, in partnership with Kishugu Aviation contracted helicopters and spotter aircraft to supply aerial resources to the mainly Greater Tzaneen and Greater Letaba local areas. These aircraft have been paid for by the landowners who are members of the Letaba Fire protection Association. From time-to-time a National Helicopter has also been based in Bela-Bela, where landowners are responsible for the flying time on those resources.

“The vision therefore today is to find a funding mechanism to host one of these 802’s in Limpopo province on a permanent 5-month standby during the fire season. Due to the speed of the 802 most areas of the Limpopo province can be accessed in under 1 hour and we have identified 4 or 5 runways in the province that would be able to host this aircraft,” Phillips stated.

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This will take a collaboration between Government and Landowners on a provincial, district and local level. And this type of collaboration is possible where the Western Cape government has budget over the past number of years to pay for the first hour of flying time on the aircraft. Phillips believe that through a collaborative effort there are mechanisms to pay for the standing cost of the aircraft and Kishugu Aviation has assured him that they are able to bring more 802’s into the country once they have contracts in place.

Fire is a reality to most rural communities and landowners during the dry months of June to October and effects peoples lives and economies.

Phillips said that they salute the team of men that put their lives on the line in order to safeguard communities and landowner assets during fires.

“We salute all the men and women who go out to the veldfires at all hours of the day and night, who work the long hours and protect heart and home. Fire is a unpredictable beast. We sit with moisture in the air but it just takes one or two days of high wind and everything drys out and we sit in the thick of it. The weather patterns are changing and we need to adapt with those changes,” Phillips concluded.

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