With the snow quickly melting and the grasses beginning to green, many Coloradoans are itching with cabin fever and longing for spring. Wildland fire managers, on the other hand, see the first signs of spring as quickly waning moments to prepare for fire season. On Colorado’s western slope this year’s fire season preparation differs from the past 20 as a local legend in the aviation world, Blaine Tucker, hangs up his Nomex for good.

“Blaine’s retirement from flying fires will leave a gap in locally-based fire coverage for the northwestern part of the state,” said Kent Hamilton, Colorado aviation and safety management specialist for the BLM and National Park Service. “For the first time in years, the BLM and the Colorado State Forest Service will have to preposition aircraft near Craig when fire potential is high.”

Tucker, a lifelong resident of Craig, Colo., has been a reliable aviation resource in the northwestern part of the state since the early 1980s. His father was in the spray business (more commonly known as crop dusting) and taught him how to fly the family company’s Super Cub, a Single Engine Air Tanker or SEAT.

Before getting directly involved in fire suppression, and when he wasn’t crop dusting, Tucker flew fire personnel on reconnaissance missions at the request of the local fire management district. This all changed in 1987, when the BLM Little Snake Field Office asked Tucker to take the spray plane and drop foam (a suppressant) on the Cry Wolf Fire near Elk Springs.

That day – and fire – marked the beginning of federal and state wildland firefighters using Tucker and his SEAT to suppress fires in northwestern Colorado.

“Blaine was the only SEAT I worked with for several years so I took his accuracy and flying proficiency for granted,” said Dale Beckerman, fire management specialist, for the Northwest Colorado Fire Management Unit. “After being exposed to other SEAT pilots, I realized just how good Blaine is.”

Tucker dropped foam for nearly 15 years before switching to retardant in the late 1990s. During his foam-dropping days, he would land and reload his plane at “primitive” airstrips, as well as county roads. These primitive runways were merely dirt and grass strips that ranchers and landowners built years before. Blaine used these airstrips to shorten his turnaround time to and from fires.

“It’s amazing how he did it,” Beckerman said. “Blaine would send a water and fuel truck to these airstrips for reloading foam. He’d meet them, reload, and then be off again in a cloud of dust.”  

Locals were well aware of Tucker's likelihood to use the remote grass and dirt airstrips of “Peck Mesa” and “Erceg’s Place” during the summer months of fire season. Both primitive airstrips were closer to the area’s most fire-prone locations than the well-developed Craig airport.

As his experience in fire suppression grew, Tucker quickly learned the benefit of retardant-reload bases for quicker turnaround times and more efficient fire suppression. He soon decided to build and manage his own retardant-mixing facility and began a partnership with the local fire-management agencies in the area. Relying on the Northwest Colorado Fire Management Unit to purchase the retardant concentrate, this base was the first remote retardant-reload base (not on wheels) in the country.

Tucker's reload base was a significant advancement for aerial firefighting operations in Colorado because it made reloading easier and faster for any SEAT flying fire missions there.

“Blaine’s work serves as a model for how retardant is managed in Colorado to this day,” Hamilton said.

In addition to Colorado, Tucker helped other states such as Utah and Nevada suppress fires. During such missions, he would drop seed from his aircraft to revegetate burned areas. Throughout his firefighting career, Tucker has gone though numerous engine upgrades to increase his hauling capacity and safety margin.

“Blaine has been a ‘quiet’ leader and a consistent provider of quality service from the beginning,” said Mark Bickhman, National SEAT program manager.

Tucker's retirement will be felt throughout the Colorado wildland firefighting community. Year after year, he has been a reliable resource for initial attack fire operations, and managers are already planning for his absence by prepositioning aircraft in Craig during high fire activity.

“We never had to worry about initial attack fires in that part of the state before,” Hamilton said. “We just had to pick up the phone, call Blaine, and rest assured things were well-covered.”