Training and Workforce
Business Aviation Steps Up in LA Wildfire Fight
Companies across the industry spectrum stepped up to offer assistance
StandardAero team members posing in front of Super Scooper
StandardAero Van Nuys team members pose in front of the fully repaired Canadair CL-415 Super Scooper, which was damaged in a midair collision with a privately operated drone during a firefighting mission over Los Angeles on January 9. Knowing the urgency to get the water bomber back in the fight as soon as possible, the company worked around the clock over a weekend to get it ready to go.

The business aviation ecosystem played a critical role in helping mitigate the wildfires that raged through the Los Angeles area from January 7, even as local staffers faced their own concerns. Almost fully extinguished by the end of January, the blazes killed nearly 30 people, destroyed more than 12,000 buildings, and scorched close to 80 square miles.

A day after the fires began to spread across Los Angeles County, then-President Biden and California Governor Gavin Newsom held a press conference at beleaguered Santa Monica Airport (KSMO), which is facing closure later in the decade. KSMO is now supporting operations in the Palisades fire zone as a staging area for erosion control materials as the area faces its next crisis in the form of mudslides, exacerbated by the destruction of vegetation on the charred hillsides.

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