Opération Pélican, a bord d'un canadair-bombardier d'eau - Documentaire Thalassa

Video from the channel Ici et ailleurs, voyages about Canadair CL-415, linked on its Above Ten Thousand entry. Duration: 12:27. Language: French. Video type: Documentary.

Documentary from the Thalassa magazine (France 3, 2012) that follows the Canadair crews of the French Sécurité civile during a fire season in Corsica, with footage filmed aboard the amphibious aircraft.

In late June, part of the crews based in Marignane move to Ajaccio airport, ready to take off from dawn to dusk. The previous summer, firefighters had responded to more than fifty fires on the island, caused by lightning, brush burning and often by arsonists. Commander Daniel, a former Patrouille de France pilot, trains his co-pilot Alex in skimming seawater off the surface to fill the tanks.

Before flying they check the launch doors, the water intakes — the size of a hand (which disproves the legend of divers being sucked in) — and the deflectors that keep salt water out of the engines. In the gulf, choppy seas crossed with the wind force the training to move to the harbour. The aircraft fills its tanks in 12 seconds. In a fire near Figari, reconstructed with onboard cameras, the aircraft arrive already loaded and attack the fire in coordination with the ground command, watching that no firefighters are under the drop. With reinforcements from the mainland, eight or ten aircraft can gather, dropping about 6 tonnes every few minutes for three or four hours. The fire is put out in under an hour. In fifty years, 29 pilots have died on operations.