Medium Large Transport
Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP); Flight Crew Flight Engineer; Flight Crew Multiengine; Flight Crew Flight Instructor
Flight Crew Last 90 Days 200; Flight Crew Total 16800; Flight Crew Type 1000
Other / Unknown
Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy; Inflight Event / Encounter Weather / Turbulence
General None Reported / Taken
Weather; Human Factors; Company Policy
This report concerns the United States Fire Service (USFS); a government agency that I contract to; and non-FAA certified non-pilot resource managers that call themselves 'dispatchers'. I fly a firefighting air tanker and while on a mission; we are a Public Aircraft. Precluding this report are several 'non-flights' where I declined to go to a wild land fire due to meteorological conditions or daylight requirements. These have been followed up by complaints about me to the hierarchy of my government contractor and ultimately to me for explanation. This has ultimately affected my aeronautical decision making; for I have begun 'second guessing' to avoid any repercussions. So much of our dispatches are off airway and through areas of non or un-forecast weather that I believe that we must always favor decision making in its most conservative sense. I received a fire dispatch to go to Eastern Idaho (approximately 400 NM). I was given a choice to load retardant or not (in which case I would stop at a base closer to the fire for retardant); I chose not to load. I flight planned on my computer and showed and briefed the route with my First Officer. Checking the weather; we saw that there were areas of light to medium precipitation both North and South of my route. Departure; en route and arrival aerodromes were all reporting clear with better than 10 NM visibility. The satellite photos did show smoke all along the route; however. No pilot reports were available. For the entire flight we were encountering flight visibility from 20 NM to as little as 5 NM. Some of the route was between intermittent cloud layers with occasional scattered to broken tops below us and alto stratus and cumulonimbus above us. All of the route was basic VFR; though we had to fly in reference to instruments some of the time. About half way to our destination; Dispatch gave us a divert to Pocatello; ID (PIH approximately 200 NM south) to load and go to a new fire. The XM download on the Garmin 396 showed an area of light to medium precipitation (later observed as Cumulonimbus Mammatus) directly on our route and ending just north of PIH. The bases were initially 13;500 FT; but steadily dropped to approximately 11;000 FT in light rain. PIH was VFR with a 30 degree crosswind gusting to 22 KTS. The direct route was over 9;000-12;000 plus mountainous terrain. To the right of course was mostly lower terrain; but then it had occasional above 13;000 FT peaks. The sector altitudes were approximately 10;000-11;000 FT and between 12;000 and 13;200 to the right as well. We had to continually deviate to the right of course for terrain and weather. We were able to maintain greater than 2;000 plus terrain clearance; but had to maneuver to do so. Flight visibility quickly dropped to about 5 miles. The ATC radar was unfortunately of no assistance since they were experiencing some outages. The route was off airways and had no airports or forecasts. The weather forced us to divert towards taller terrain with decreasing ceilings. The last 50 miles was in and out of light rain with 20 miles visibility over 4;000 FT flat terrain. The next time I get a similar divert off of my flight planned route with any kind of weather and no forecasting; I will decline or land somewhere VFR to check weather if empty. This was a case of [a] Dispatchers harassment affecting my judgment.
Air Tanker pilot reports being harassed by USFS 'dispatchers' to accept missions that are unacceptable due to meteorological conditions or daylight requirements. The managers are non-FAA certified non-pilot resource managers that call themselves 'dispatchers'.