FOREST AIR SERVICE

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 73, 23 September 1930, Page 9

FOREST AIR SERVICE

SUPPRESSION OF FIRES

A DAY BY DAY PATROL

(From "The Post's" Representative.) VANCOUVEB, 20th August. During last summer, the Ontario Provincial Air Service flew" 11,602 hours with 26 machines, mainly combating j bush fires. This was its sixth year of I service. The service is maintained by the Provincial Government for the protection of the vast forest wealth in Northern Ontario, especially that section which lies above the railway right of way. It is a non-commercial service operated on highly efficient commercial lines, its cost charged to the various Government departments which make use of it. It has the distinction of being the largest aerial fire-fighting force in the world, with practically all its work confined to the protection of the bush in a country which is traversed only by. canoe. Some of the pilots have notable records in the lino of duty. One, who went to Eielson's rescue last spring, flew 889 hours in the summer. Another had one day of fifteen hours in the air. A third had a week's flying record of 60 hours. (

Planes go on patrol every day. When a fire is sighted, the nearest base is notified. By moans of a chain of twenty short-wave radio stations in the region, headquarters is notified and orders ont 'planes and supplies to fly men and fire-fighting equipment to the scene of the outbreak. 'Planes run back and forth till enough men are o: hand to cope with it. When the fire is out, the 'planes call for the men and equipment again.

Tlic international cable news appearing In this issue is published by arrangement with, the Australian Press Association anil tha' "Sun," !'HeraW Sews Service, Hmltwt