Tanker Crews

The Board of Directors of the Chico Air Museum has chosen to memorialize ten pilots employed as air tanker crew by Aero Union Corporation (AUC). Celebrating its 45^th Anniversary in 2006, AUC has long been recognized as a world leader in developing and operating a long list of air tanker aircraft.

Aero Union had its early roots in Chico beginning in 1964 and is a major sponsor to the Chico Air Museum; it has also put aircraft, including SP2H Tanker 16, on display in our outside museum.

The following is a brief background of each crew who lost their lives in protecting America’s wild land and private property:

Bob Bloomfield & Mark Sloan: These pilots perished in an Aero Union B-26 outside of Springerville, AZ in June 1971. Bob had extensive experience in firefighting and was originally a bush pilot in Alaska.
Harry Owens: Harry’s TBM air tanker went down in federal lands outside of Quincy, CA after the aircraft was hit by a USFS lead plane. Harry was a well-experienced pilot having first served in the military and as a charter pilot for Chico Aviation Inc., an AUC subsidiary. The lead plane pilot was able to ditch without injury.
John Sieglinger & Robert Shaw: P3 Tanker-24 crashed on Little St. Joseph Peak near Hamilton, MT in bad weather. T-24 had been dispatched from Goleta,CA that afternoon to fight a lumber mill fire near Missoula.
Gary Cockrell & Lisa Nitsch: Gary and Lisa's DC4 was rear-ended by a USFS lead plane while on the approach to the Ramona Airport after having been working on fires in the Cleveland NF that day. Remarkably, while there was extensive damage to homes surrounding the crash site, none of the neighbors or inhabitants were killed nor injured.
Tom Lynch, Brian Bruns & Paul Cockrell: (Yes, Paul was Gary's brother, dying almost ten years apart.) These three tanker captains were highly skilled and experienced; Tom had previously been a line tanker pilot and had been promoted to AUC's Chief Pilot position in 1996. Brian and Paul had been assigned to a wide variety of tanker types over the years and had served with honor as tanker captains. Their P3 crashed in April 2005 while flying training flights in the foothills of the Lassen NF outside of Red Bluff, CA.

The Board and Members of the Chico Air Museum salute these brave individuals who perished in service to the thousands of Americans threatened by the imminent danger of wild land fires.