Charter helicopters helping to battle N.S. wildfires

Firefighters in Nova Scotia are getting extra help from the skies as charter helicopter crews work to knock down several major wildfires. 

One of the private companies hired by the province is Breton Air, which is based out of Sydney, N.S.

Company president Matt Wallace reached out to the Department of Natural Resources and Renewables on Sunday, and was called into action within hours. 

Wallace is piloting a helicopter carrying buckets of up to 750 litres of water at a time. That water is being used to extinguish spot fires popping up in the Tantallon area north of Halifax. Another pilot who works for Breton Air has been doing the same to tackle fires in Shelburne County in southwestern Nova Scotia which are burning out of control.

"There's areas where it's just apocalyptic," Wallace said in an interview with Information Morning Cape Breton on Friday.

"It's tragic… You can really grasp what people were doing in their yards when they had to drop everything and run. And to see this here at home, it's heartbreaking."

Working in tandem

Wallace said in Tantallon there are five helicopters working as a team, including two Department of Natural Resources helicopters that are used to survey the area for signs of burning. When a fire is reported, Wallace and the other charter pilots are able to respond with water within a few minutes. 

"It's working very well to contain these flare ups in the Halifax area and we're getting more and more every day," he said. "We're on site to be able to jump on anything outside of the main fire."

 Wallace said he's proud of the work he's doing and that every little bit of water dropped can help.

 "There's lots of emotions, I guess … and to see this landscape scorched the way it is. I think in the coming weeks people will get to see more of what it actually looks like, and from the air it's devastating."

The Halifax-area wildfire remains at 50 per cent containment while meanwhile the Barrington Lake fire grew Friday to an estimated 22,766 hectares

 A Department of Natural Resources spokesperson said pilots were unable to get into some areas of that fire because of smoke and fire intensity.

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