Trending Topics

Watch: CAL FIRE’s new C-130 tanker responds to first fire

Tanker 122 dropped 8,000 gallons of retardant on the Record Fire in Riverside County

By David Caraccio
Merced Sun-Star

RIVERSIDE COUNTY, Calif. — A new video shows the first fully operational C-130H delivering 8,000 gallons of retardant on the Record Fire in Riverside County, marking its inaugural firefighting mission over the weekend.

Tanker 122 has joined the fleet of the state’s firefighting agency, CAL FIRE.

“This marks an historic milestone in the agency’s ongoing commitment to CA!” Cal Fire chief Joe Tylor said on X.

California officials waited more than five years to get the first of several military aircraft they were promised by the federal government to help fight fires across the state.

(c)2024 the Merced Sun-Star (Merced, Calif.)
Visit the Merced Sun-Star (Merced, Calif.) at www.mercedsunstar.com
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Trending
More than 200 first responders battled the two-story row home blaze for about three hours, with four victims dying at the scene and two more pronounced dead at the hospital, as fire marshals investigate a lithium-ion battery found at the scene
Aurora Engine 7 arrived to find smoke showing from the second floor and a resident reporting a child trapped in an Elkhart Way apartment
A 2019 memo warning that AI could introduce bias based on accents, disabilities and race went unaddressed before the department began using the technology on live 911 medical calls in 2023, prompting experts to call for suspending its use until a public evaluation is completed
Officials confirmed thermal runaway from batteries stored in plastic toolboxes on a third-floor porch sparked the May Dorchester fire that killed 24-year veteran Robert “Bobby” Kilduff Jr.