The other day I noticed a Dash 8 jump ship flying from up north to Inyo or Kings or something like that. It was flying high and fast, presumably because it is pressurized, it is a small airliner.
Then I noticed maybe 2 Dash 8s that are tankers yesterday.
My main question is how it is used for actual jumping since it presumably is more meant to be an airliner than a slow speed low altitude plane.
It seems like I have not seen one flying as an airliner in my area in years, I think they got replaced with jets on most regular routes. Maybe there are surplus airframes available for fire use?
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There are lots and lots of Dash-8s out there, plus more being built.
The Dash-8-200 can be used for jumping, same as a lot of other twin turborops.
The much longer Dash-8-400 (aka Q400) is used for tanker work.
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I get the pleasure of working on an integration with this Dash-8 first of its kind in a few weeks. Airtanker plus ISR platform. Has an MX-15 camera on it. Plan is for full TAK integration.
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I was just wondering recently if CalFire has thought ahead to replacing the S-2s in the medium-ish tanker role, and how the Dash-8 Q200 or Q300 would be an interesting candidate; along with the Dornier 328 or Embraer 120. There’s a big gap between the SEATs and the C-130s, after all, and those S-2 airframes aren’t getting any younger, and new ones haven’t been manufactured in a long time.
Though I don’t think they’d care for a multirole plane, if only because of how expensive it would be. Just something with 1000-1500 gallon capacity and smaller airfield capability.
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Yeah the muli-role thing is niche for sure, especially since they have one king air now that does ISR and some contract ships and we have OES FIRIS planes as well but I am super excited to get to work on the Metrea Fireswift sometime hopefully in October. Already had a couple of delays but hey thats how technology and moving parts go. I do think we are gonna open some eyes on the art of the possible with air to ground shared consciousness.
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