A Port Alberni company just bought 10 retired air force Hercules to fight fire

Ten Hercules military transports the Royal Canadian Air Force retired in January are heading to Port Alberni, where Coulson Aviation plans to turn them into wildfire tankers.

Each conversion adds a 4,000-gallon tank and costs $10 million to $14 million, taking roughly 20,000 work-hours. Company president Wayne Coulson called the aircraft a game changer, and said he hopes to have at least two ready to fight B.C. fires by next season. The deal makes Coulson the third-largest operator of the Hercules in the world.

Courtenay-Alberni MP Gord Johns framed it as a win for the Island, and pushed for something bigger. "It should be the beginning of a permanent, sovereign national aerial firefighting capacity that can be deployed across Canada when communities need it most," he said.

The timing lands hard. In the Cariboo, the Pear Lake wildfire had grown to 124,656 hectares by Aug. 4, with eight evacuation orders in effect. The sale is still conditional on Transport Canada approvals, and the bulk of the work will be done in Port Alberni, with more at Abbotsford and Kelowna.