Swordsmyth
08-11-2018, 01:58 AM
An Air Force staff officer says firefighters battling blazes in California and Colorado (https://nypost.com/2018/08/08/biggest-blaze-in-california-history-stretches-firefighters-resources-thin/) should take a page from Sweden’s playbook and drop bombs on the conflagrations to extinguish them.
On its surface, the notion flies in the face of logic — how could an explosion put out a fire? But USAF Staff Officer Mike Benitez says shockwaves caused by detonation can blow out fires like candles on a birthday cake.
“This was recently put into practice in Sweden, where a Gripen fighter jet from the Swedish Air Force dropped a single 500-pound bomb on a forest fire, momentarily depriving the blaze of oxygen and successfully extinguishing it within 100 yards of the detonation point,” wrote Benitez, a former Marine and current Air Force officer, on his blog warontherocks.com (https://warontherocks.com/2018/08/shocking-wildfires-into-submission-a-proposal/).
Indeed, the Swedes delivered the fire-fighting payload on July 25 when a blaze that traditional firefighters could not reach (https://nypost.com/2018/07/19/sweden-is-being-burned-to-a-crisp-by-raging-wildfires/) began to threaten a residential community, according to vehicle-tech website The Drive. (http://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/22395/a-swedish-air-force-gripen-fighter-jet-just-literally-bombed-a-forest-fire)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YKERL6m1wk
More at: https://nypost.com/2018/08/09/air-force-officer-wants-to-use-bombs-to-fight-california-wildfires/
On its surface, the notion flies in the face of logic — how could an explosion put out a fire? But USAF Staff Officer Mike Benitez says shockwaves caused by detonation can blow out fires like candles on a birthday cake.
“This was recently put into practice in Sweden, where a Gripen fighter jet from the Swedish Air Force dropped a single 500-pound bomb on a forest fire, momentarily depriving the blaze of oxygen and successfully extinguishing it within 100 yards of the detonation point,” wrote Benitez, a former Marine and current Air Force officer, on his blog warontherocks.com (https://warontherocks.com/2018/08/shocking-wildfires-into-submission-a-proposal/).
Indeed, the Swedes delivered the fire-fighting payload on July 25 when a blaze that traditional firefighters could not reach (https://nypost.com/2018/07/19/sweden-is-being-burned-to-a-crisp-by-raging-wildfires/) began to threaten a residential community, according to vehicle-tech website The Drive. (http://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/22395/a-swedish-air-force-gripen-fighter-jet-just-literally-bombed-a-forest-fire)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YKERL6m1wk
More at: https://nypost.com/2018/08/09/air-force-officer-wants-to-use-bombs-to-fight-california-wildfires/