If anyone is around Sacramento, 6 of the MAFFS (Modular Airborne Firefighting System) C130’s have been activated and are currently based out of the old Mclellan AFB (Sacramento, CA) for the fires in Northern, CA. These are standard guard C130’s with a slide in tank system for retardant. They receive bright colored markings for the duration of their service as air tankers.
It is somewhat unusual for these to be activated in California, definately would make a different C130 build. I have some photos of the tank system out of the aircraft if anyone decides to build one.
If anyone makes it up to Mclellan and gets some pics please share, I’d like to see some when they are on the ground.
Thanks, and the pics don’t have to be pretty, just curious to see them. I got a couple of an Idaho NG C130 MAFFS a couple years ago but not the best angle.
I tried to get a few of the USMC CH-46s that were activated in Lemoore but trees managed to get in the way everytime they came by. [:(]
I’ve seen the Blackhawks and C130’s a few times over the years but USMC '46s was a new one. New for them too, this was the first time they had been used on a fire (or at least this unit anyway.
There were 8 or so C-130’s at McClellan today, but there wasn’t much opportunity for flying shots. I did get a few, and I took a ton of pictures of them on the ramp. There was a K-Max sporting about and I got some of it as well. I’ll put some more on my web site soon and post a link in this thread.
