NASA-Armstrong DC-8 Airborne Science Laboratory sits on the east ramp of the 124th Fighter Wing, Boise, Idaho, 23JUL2019. Idaho Air National Guard photo by Master Sergeant Joshua C. Allmaras.
NASA’s aged and heavily modified DC-8 airliner is conducting air monitoring missions in relation to the growing wildfire danger in the western U.S.
Idaho National Guard A-10Cs in the foreground, NASA’s DC-8 FIREX-AQ takes off from Gowen Field (Boise Airport), 30JUL2019.
President Donald Trump is portrayed by the ‘main-stream’ news media as being anti-climate, yet since he became President of the United States NASA (National Aeronautics Space Administration) has seemingly increased its studies of the effects of pollution and wildfires (including prescribed burns and agricultural fires) on the atmosphere.
On 23JUL2019, NASA held an explainer day for Idaho news media, and as you can tell not many showed up. Idaho Air National Guard photo by Master Sergeant Joshua C. Allmaras.
Looking like chaff/flare dispensers these are actually Airborne-Synthetic Aperture Radar (AirSAR) antenna. NASA photo 26MAR1998.
NASA says their DC-8 flys at 42-thousand feet (12-thousand-801 meters or 12.80 kilometers) for as long as 12 hours, collecting air samples with the many antennae protruding from the fuselage.
FIREX-AQ sensors. Idaho Air National Guard photo by Master Sergeant Joshua C. Allmaras, 23JUL2019.
More sensors, Idaho Air National Guard photo by Master Sergeant Joshua C. Allmaras, 23JUL2019.
In 2016, the NASA DC-8 was in Korea conducting high-altitude monitoring of air quality, from Osan Air Base. U.S. Air Force photo by Technical Sergeant Travis Edwards, 27APR2016.
Video explainer of NASA’s DC-8 mission over Korea:
In Northern Territory, the Australian military, along with U.S. Marines, trained for operation Crocodile Response, a bilateral humanitarian assistance and disaster relief exercise in order to more rapidly respond to natural disasters and crises throughout the region.
South Korea Ministry of Environment’ K-water operations, and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, work with NASA to develop satellite technology in the hopes of preventing future water disasters.
U.S. personnel from Osan Air Base respond to the aftermath of Typhoon Lingling, 07SEP2019.
UNITED STATES: FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) hints that its running out of money by telling people to save money to help pay for disaster expenses!
USMC video promoting 30SEP2019 deployment to Colombia, bragging about spending U.S. taxes to help the South American country prep for a major natural disaster:
Yet again, U.S. taxes going to send U.S. Marines to Central American countries for yet more natural disaster preps (in October):
Idaho; Idaho State University, working with Idaho National Laboratory and Center for Advanced Energy Studies, gets $1.1-million taxpayer funded grant to build first ever Disaster Response Complex. The goal is to train emergency responders in a realistic catastrophic environment with multiple scenarios such as earthquakes, hurricanes, flooding, and even terrorist threats.
Health professionals representing 20 countries gathered for the 22nd annual Health Emergencies in Large Populations (H.E.L.P.) course in Honolulu, from September 9th-20th. It was hosted by Center for Excellence in Disaster Management and Humanitarian Assistance (CFE-DM) in collaboration with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the University of Hawai’i Office of Public Health Studies. The main goal is to create a common language, and procedures, between civilian and military emergency responders around the world.
Even though Mongolia is not a Pacific Rim country, the U.S. decided to conduct humanitarian assistance and disaster relief ‘Pacific Resilience’ training in the Central Asian country, and ordered Oregon’s Army National Guard to participate.
“We are going to have to stop being the policemen of the world.”-Donald Trump, August 2015 interview with Hugh Hewitt
Idaho Army National Guard photo by Thomas Alvarez, 27APR2019.
At the end of April 2019, Idaho Army National Guard’s 1-183rd Assault Helicopter Battalion deployed to Guatemala in support of operation Beyond the Horizon.
Idaho Army National Guard photo by Thomas Alvarez, 27APR2019.
Keep in mind this is the Central American country allegedly sending the most illegals into the U.S., forcing the U.S. President to make a deal with the leaders of Guatemala to make an effort to keep their people home (never mind that the U.S. Department of Defense spends untold tax dollars conducting massive military and natural disaster training ops in Guatemala).
Idaho Army National Guard photo by Thomas Alvarez, 27APR2019.
1-183rd Assault Helicopter Battalion will provide casualty evacuation support and equipment transportation for National Guard engineers and medics as they spend U.S. taxes building schools and medical clinics in Guatemala.
Idaho Army National Guard photo by Thomas Alvarez, 27APR2019.
The 1-183rd’s mission to Guatemala ended on 27JUL2019.
Official video explainer of Idaho UH-60 Black Hawk refueling ops in Guatemala:
Interview with Idaho Black Hawk crew concerning mass casualty training in Guatemala:
Bannock County-City of Chubbuck-City of Pocatello, Idaho, are home to numerous taxpayer sapping ‘white elephant’ projects, from Hoku to the latest Siphon Road-Interstate 15 connector (bridge to nowhere)/Northgate District.
Storm clouds forming over yet another White Elephant for taxpayers?
All that farmland going to be torn up to build homes for…nobody?
Looking south along I-15, from the Pocatello side of where the Siphon Road-I-15 connector bridge is being built.
Looking towards Chubbuck, the Sun is already setting on the Bridge to Nowhere.
Chubbuck spent tax dollars putting in an intersection where Siphon Road ended, it’s now overgrown with weeds and you can hear the pedestrian crossing signals beeping in the wind.
This is the new part of Siphon Road, in Chubbuck, which still doesn’t go anywhere. The Road Closed sign has been run-over numerous times.
“He’s as blind as he can be Just sees what he wants to see….
…….Sitting in his nowhere land Making all his nowhere plans for nobody”-The Beatles, Nowhere Man
In this report, which chronicles the destruction of iconic Green T, the mayor of Chubbuck boasts it’s “…the beginning of some real good things coming in.”: POPEYES QUIETLY SHUTS DOWN FOUR IDAHO RESTAURANTS!
MD-87 (foreground) and DC-10 (background) tankers rolling in from their latest east Idaho mission. Photo by AAron B. Hutchins.
The Sheep Fire is just one of dozens of wild fires in Idaho right now so, once again, the little used Pocatello Airport was put to good use by water bombers from 10 Tanker Air Carrier and Erickson Aero Tanker.
Photo by AAron B. Hutchins.
Photo by AAron B. Hutchins.
Photo by AAron B. Hutchins.
A little bird water bomber heads out. Photo by AAron B. Hutchins.
Photo by AAron B. Hutchins.
A new U.S. Forest Service King Air 250 FAC (Forward Air Controller) taking off. Photo by AAron B. Hutchins.
Before you go on to look at the pics, I was allowed to see a secret room in the main airport building where a very nice 1/48 scale Monogram model diorama of the very same F-101B was gathering dust. The diorama showed tail code AF-90 PO-417 on the flightline in Germany during the Cold War. Today’s gate guard is painted to match that diorama except it doesn’t have the Native American chief in his warbonnet painted on the nose of the aircraft, near the cockpit. There was a small plaque on the diorama explaining the aircraft history, but I didn’t get much time to read it. I asked if I could get my camera and take a pic of it, but was told I shouldn’t even be in the ‘room’. So, supposedly PO-417 was an actual F-101B, yet a quick internet search revealed no such thing (apparently ‘PO’ isn’t a real USAF tail code).
To update this story, I was recently ‘gifted’ a little red book called The First Fifty Years: Michaud Flats, U.S. Army Base, Pocatello Regional Airport. It explains the Pocatello Voodoo was originally slated to be burned up as a fire trainer for the Utah Air National Guard. It was one of two such planes that were already fully dismantled, the Utah Guard decided it wasn’t worth the effort to put them back together just to set them on fire. Around 1988, Idaho Senator Jim McClure used his pull to get one of the dismembered Voodoo’s to the Pocatello Airport. Funding for the project came from several donors including the J.R. Simplot Company (which at that time had its corporate HQ in Pocatello, along the border with Chubbuck), and the actual rebuilding of the plane was done by Idaho State University (ISU) Aviation Mechanics School (still located at the airport today). It was the ISU students who decided on the paint scheme, and created the fake afterburners as the real afterburners were missing.
The 238 paged, hardcover book was published in 1993, it’s available directly from the Pocatello Airport (208) 234-6154. I was also told the Idaho Unlimited gift shop carried the book, but it didn’t show up when I searched their website.
Click the pics to make bigger:
Check out those Fake News Cans.
Interesting that despite no engines or hydraulics, and a recent paint job, there’s oil leakage!
15 July 2019-21:32 UTC-07 Tango 06 (25 Tir 1398/13 Dhu l-Qa’da 1440/14 Xin-Wei 4717)
Photo by AAron B. Hutchins.
Another year, another round of wild fires, and Pocatello Airport is temporary home (once again) to DC-10 water bombers. Two were spotted, numbers 911 and 912.
Click the pics (by AAron B. Hutchins) to make them bigger:
#911
Kit bashers note that the retardant tank is not flush with the fuselage.