Team Begins Around-the-Clock Duty, Apprenticeship to Train Future Firefighters

Coulson Aviation has gotten a $400 million Aussie dollar (about $269,320,000 USD) 10-year contract with Australia’s New South Wales (NSW) Rural Fire Service (RFS), putting them in charge of the entire firefighting fleet.

The deal has some additional benefits this time around, expanding on Coulson's role over the last 5 years simply managing, operating, and maintaining the local firefighting air wing. Now, the Coulson team will take care of 11 aircraft in all, including one of their flagship Boeing 737 FIRELINER Large Airtankers (LAT). The fleet includes a pair of Cessna Citations, half a dozen Bell-412 helicopters, a CH-47 Chinook, and a Beechcraft Super King Air. The fleet saw more than 340 missions completed over the '22-'23 bushfire season, rescuing more than 113 lives in all. The Fireliner was kept quite busy too, deploying more than 600,000 liters of retardant over 41 flights.

Coulson says it will "focus on employing primarily Australian crews" to bolster the regions' "self-sufficiency and reduce reliance on international personnel." That will necessitate the expansion of their apprenticeship program, with at least two mechanical apprentices kept on the team in a bid to train them up on fleet maintenance close to home. Coulson Aviation was proud to mention its newfound status as a Transport Canada Approved Training Organization (ATO), which allows them to train their technicians on the clock. That will allow them a wider breadth of candidates, since there aren't too many kids who can afford to work for free these days. Paid positions that net experience and certification are much easier to fill, after all.

"We are extremely pleased to have been chosen as the sole aviation supplier to operate the NSW Rural Fire Service owned fleet of firefighting and emergency services aircraft,” said Wayne Coulson CEO, of Coulson Group.” Coulson Aviation Australia has been the leading supplier of Large Air Tankers and Very Large Heli-Tankers to the Australian Governments for the past decade and it’s an honor to have been selected again, to continue to run RFS’s world-class fleet.”

“The RFS has found a reliable and high-performing partner in Coulson Aviation, and we look forward to working with them as our aerial capability continues to expand,” said Rob Rogers, Commissioner of the RFS.

FMI: www.coulsonaviationusa.com