3 U.S. firefighters killed
Crew aboard plane that crashed battling flames in Australia.
SYDNEY — Three American firefighting airplane crew members were killed Thursday when the C-130 Hercules aerial water tanker they were in crashed while battling wildfires in southeastern Australia, officials said.
The men were identified as Capt. Ian H. McBeth, 44, of Great Falls, Mont.; first officer Paul Clyde Hudson, 42, of Buckeye, Ariz.; and flight engineer Rick A. DeMorgan Jr., 43, of Navarre, Fla., Canada-based Coulson Aviation said in a statement.
New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian confirmed the deaths in the state’s Snowy Monaro region, which came as Australia grapples with an unprecedented fire season that has left millions of acres of destruction.
In its statement, Coulson said McBeth “was a highly qualified and respected C-130 pilot with many years fighting fire, both in the military and with Coulson Aviation.”
McBeth, who is survived by his wife and three children, also served with the Montana and Wyoming National Guard, the company said.
Hudson “graduated from the Naval Academy in 1999 and spent the next twenty years serving in the United States Marine Corps in a number of positions including C-130 pilot,” Coulson said. He is survived by his wife.
DeMorgan served in the U.S. Air Force with 18 years as a flight engineer on the C-130, the company said. He had more than 4,000 hours as a flight engineer and nearly 2,000 hours in combat.
“Rick’s passion was always flying and his children,” Coulson said. He is survived by two children, his parents and his sister.
Canada-based Coulson Aviation said in a statement that one of its Lockheed large air tankers was lost after it left Richmond in New South Wales with retardant for a firebombing mission. It said the crash site was “extensive” but provided few other details.
“The only thing I have from the field reports are that the plane came down, it’s crashed and there was a large fireball associated with that crash,” Rural Fire Service Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons said.
Foreign Minister Marise Payne said she had conveyed Australia’s condolences to U.S. Ambassador Arthur Culvahouse Jr.
“Our hearts go out to their loved ones. They were helping Australia, far from their own homes, an embodiment of the deep friendship between our two countries,” she said in a statement.
Payne added: “Thank you to these three, and to all the brave firefighters from Australia and around the world. Your service and contribution are extraordinary. We are ever grateful.”
The tragedy raises the death toll from the blazes to at least 31 since September. The fires have also destroyed more than 2,600 homes and razed more than 25.7 million acres, an area bigger than the U.S. state of Indiana.
Coulson grounded other firefighting aircraft as a precaution pending investigation, reducing planes available to firefighters in New South Wales and neighboring Victoria state. The four-propeller Hercules drops more than 4,000 gallons of fire retardant in a single pass.
Spokeswoman Robyn Baldwin of Coulson, with headquarters in the Canadian province of British Columbia and extensive U.S. operations, declined to identify the crew members or say what U.S. states the firefighters were from.
Australian Transport Safety Bureau, the national air crash investigator, and state police will investigate the crash site, which firefighters described as an active fire ground.
“There is no indication at this stage of what’s caused the accident,” Fitzsimmons said.
Also Thursday, Canberra Airport closed temporarily because of nearby wildfires, and residents south of the city were told to seek shelter. The airport reopened after several hours with Qantas operating limited services, but Virgin and Singapore Airlines canceled flights for the rest of the day.