The five new fire-retardant loading pits will be up and running for service starting June 1st, just in time for fire season this year.
REDDING, Calif. - A $28 million, multi-phased project is coming to fruition to modernize a local fire attack base in Redding.
On Thursday, there was a celebration and ribbon-cutting ceremony for new enhancements at the Redding Air Attack Base.
And thanks to money from the federal government, that one-of-a-kind, modern-designed base is now in Northern California. And there are no others like it in the world.
The project has been five years in the making, with the help of the U.S. Army Corps Engineers, the City of Redding, and the Shasta-Trinity National Forest.
Five new fire-retardant loading pits
"This will be the flagship of tanker bases in the world. This is important because this doesn't happen all the time, and not only are we proud of what's been built here and what's happening here, but I want you to understand that it is a process; government is a process, and when it works really well, we get amazing things that help people, that put out fires, and that keep people safe,” Mayor Tenessa Audette of Redding said.
The five new fire retardant loading pits will allow up to five air tankers to simultaneously reload fire retardant, as well as increase the supply at the base from three million gallons to more than six million gallons.
Regional Aviation Officer for the U.S. Forest Service, Josh Mathiesen, said the five retardant pits in Redding are a game changer when it comes to fighting fires.
"When you can load air tankers simultaneously without losing any pressure capability, the speed at which you can load them, just the way that the pits are designed to accommodate the larger aircraft that we're utilizing in firefighting these days, all that stuff is state of the art. No other base has been built to this design because there's no new bases right now except for this one,” Mathiesen said.
The five new fire-retardant loading pits will be up and running for service starting June 1st, just in time for fire season this year.
Now that phase one of the project is complete, work will start on phase two to replace the hangar at the Redding Air Attack Base, which dates back to World War 2.
