Province in discussions with owners of Martin Mars

[zerograv]

http://globalnews.ca/news/2093551/updat ... r-bombers/

[Frisk]

Outdated and ineffective. Seriously why do people want it back?

[dieseluphammerdown]

Outdated and ineffective. Seriously why do people want it back?

how so ?

[GordonH]

Maybe its no so much wanting them back, as it could be running low on resources to fight fires.

[Barney Google]

http://www.castanet.net/edition/news-st ... htm#143564

Obviously a lot of people must think bringing them back is important

[madadam]

Shouldn't it be Martin Mar as only 1 plane may be coming back to service. And here is more info on the one he is trying to get sent to a museum in the States.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canadia ... -1.3065537

[GordonH]

Air Tractors are much more effective, in time it takes that flying monster to get 1 load the smaller faster air tractors can get many loads.

[zerograv]

http://www.alberniweather.ca/fire/MarsRebuttal.pdf

here is an interesting read. At the end of the day I think Conairs $108,000 liberal donation has more to do with Coulson Group not receiving a contract in the past. That and they supported the NDP. The province needs resources to fight these fires, political BS shouldn't have anything to do with it. There is a fire in Sproat Lake and the Plane is just sitting there, it doesn't make sense to me.

[LoneWolf_53]

Air Tractors are much more effective, in time it takes that flying monster to get 1 load the smaller faster air tractors can get many loads.

Perhaps but sometimes wouldn't you say one good dump is better than ten smaller ones? 8-P

[GordonH]

^^^ Smaller lakes needed with the smaller water tanker. Could mean being closer to the fire.

[zerograv]

Did BC lose lakes or something? because for 53 years there was enough lakes in BC for the Mars to service the province, but now there isn't? hmmmm...

[GordonH]

Curious question:
How much to run Mars per day compared to Air Tractor (how many Air Tractors can run per day for price of the Mars). Does anyone know this answer.

[Swoop]

Did BC lose lakes or something? because for 53 years there was enough lakes in BC for the Mars to service the province, but now there isn't? hmmmm...

...it's got to do with the number of available lakes the aircraft can safely land/takeoff from...from the news story:

"The new skimmers can take water from about 1,700 lakes, where as the Martin Mars could only scoop water from 113,” she stated.

[canuck500]

This might answer some of your questions https://news.gov.bc.ca/factsheets/facts ... -martin-ma

[madadam]

This was in the global link:

“In 2013, when the Wildfire Management Branch last used the Martin Mars, the season rate was $672,300 with a flying time cost of $4,000 per hour for the first 45 hours and $18,800 per hour for any additional hours. This rate does not include fuel,” they said in a statement last year.

"They also only used the planes 20 times from 2007 to 2013, approximately 0.5 per cent of the airtanker missions flown during that time."