2 Dead In Firefighter Crash
For the second time in as many months, a firefighting plane has gone down in flames, killing the firefighters aboard, and a spokesman for the National Interagency Fire Center says it's believed that the same company owned both planes.
CBS News Correspondent Lee Frank reports two people were killed in Thursday's crash, in northern Colorado. Witnesses say the plane - a four-engine PB4Y - sppeared to break into pieces in the air, the wings collapsing, and then falling to the ground and starting a new fire.
The tanker, which was fighting the Big Elk Meadow wildfire about 45 miles northwest of Denver, crashed near Rocky Mountain National Park. Three air tankers, three helicopters and 80 firefighters were battling the fire.
Federal authorities will be investigating the cause of the accident.
Chris Pair was videotaping the wildfire when the plane crashed.
"I saw the plane breaking into pieces. I saw about three, maybe four pieces in flames go down," he told KCNC-TV in Denver. Pair said the plane crashed about 300 yards from U.S. 36.
The fire, believed to be human-caused, was about 45 miles northwest of Denver on steep slopes accessible only on foot or by air.
Residents of 124 homes were ordered to evacuated for the second time in two days Thursday, and the fire was threatening as many as 300 homes, fire information officer Tammy Williams said.
"Things are readily igniting. The fire is obviously growing," she said. The flames were within one mile from the homes.
The air tanker crash is the second in as many months. Last month, the U.S. Forest Service's fleet of firefighting air tankers was temporarily grounded after a C-130A air tanker crashed on June 17, killing three men.
That tanker was dropping a load of fire retardant on a fire near Walker, Calif. when its wings snapped off in mid air. The accident prompted a safety review of the forest service's C-130A air tanker fleet.
Randy Eardley, a spokesman for the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, Idaho, said he believed the plane that crashed Thursday was operated by Hawkins & Powers Aviation Inc. of Greybull, Wyo.
A woman who answered the phone at the company declined to comment late Thursday.
The plane appears on the company's Web site. And, according to the Internet site www.landings.com, the plane is registered to Hawkins & Powers.
Hawkins & Powers owned the tanker aircraft that crashed in Walker, Calif., last month. In that crash, the wings of the tanker snapped off in the air, sending the fuselage to the ground in a fireball. The crash resulted in the grounding of the nation's C-130A tankers.
Officials say the plane that crashed Thursday wasn't among those that were grounded.
Elsewhere across the West on Thursday, rain slowed wildfires in Nevada but officials in Oregon posted voluntary evacuation notices in the small towns of Ruch, near the California line, and Paisley, in the central highlands.
More than 161,000 acres have been charred in Oregon during what has been an early and active fire season.
"In my 35 years in the Forest Service, this is the most activity I've ever seen," said David Widmark of the Northwest Interagency Coordination Center in Portland, Ore.
In southern California, a brush fire erupted Thursday near a highway in San Luis Obispo County and quickly grew to more than 400 acres, forcing the evacuation of 24 homes and a campground.