IN GOOD COMPANY

These photographs were kindly supplied by tanker pilot Larry Kraus. The top photograph shows (at extreme left) the Aerial Applications Inc Douglas DC-6 N80MA Tanker 20 in company with two PV-2 Harpoons and a B-17 at the old tanker base at McCall, Idaho on 6 August 1980. All of these aircraft were working the Rattlesnake Fire in the deep canyon by the Salmon River north of McCall. The lower photograph shows some of the crew under the wing of B-17 Tanker 68. Sadly, Ralph Glasgow (third from left), the pilot of N80MA, was to lose his life in the crash of Neptune N65170 Tanker 08 on 30 September 1990 while working the Wynoochee Fire in the Olympic National Forest in Washington State. Ironically, this fire had been started by the earlier crash of a Cessna 172.

 

Left to Right
Lyle Rosendahl - Pilot of PV-2 Tanker 39 (N7080C)
Jim Keele - Pilot of PV-2 Tanker 101 (N86570)
Ralph Glasgow - Pilot of DC-6 Tanker 20 (N80MA)
Bob Franklin (USFS) - Tanker Base Manager at McCall
Gary Packard - Pilot of B-17 Tanker 22 (N207EV)
Behind Gary is Carl, Bob Franklin's assistant

Pictures and text: Larry Kraus

QUEENSLAND AIR MUSEUM www.qam.com.au