Fires like those that ravaged Greece in August would be easier to combat if more and bigger aircraft could be used, unmodified, to drop water. That may soon be possible, thanks to an invention that turns any cargo plane with a rear ramp into a 鈥渨ater bomber鈥�.
Weyerhaeuser, a US timber company, is developing 1.2-metre-wide PVC bags 鈥� each of which can hold 900 kilograms of water and fire retardant. Each bag is packaged in a box whose lid becomes a parachute when the bag is pushed from a plane鈥檚 cargo ramp. Rip cords attached to the parachute then pull upwards, unzipping the bag and releasing the water at an altitude of about 70 metres.
A C-130 Hercules cargo plane could carry 16 bags while the huge C-17 Globemaster III could double that, Weyerhaeuser says.
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