BEAR CREEK TOWNSHIP, PA — For Brock Heffner, his workplace in the sky has been traveling all over northeastern Pennsylvania this week, helping out in the fight against brush fires.
"Pretty nostalgic Vietnam-era aircraft. Everybody knows the Huey," he said.
Heffner is a pilot for a company in Gettysburg.
The state contracts him and three other pilots to assist in helping firefighters from above.
"One is stationed in Wellsboro, Pennsylvania, and one in Somerset, Pennsylvania. The one in Somerset sometimes gets bumped to mid-state, depending on the greenup. The last two years, this one has flown the most out of everything. We have a lot of fires in this area that they tend to send us onto," he said.
Heffner's been fighting fires above the skies of northeastern Pennsylvania for eight years, offering a constant supply of 350 gallons of water with every trip he takes.
"The brush trucks that they typically use will carry about 350 gallons, and that's for them to use the whole time they are there where we can move back and forth back and forth, or we can actually be their eye in the sky telling them exactly what the fire behavior is like as well," he said.
Just as Heffner started telling us about how busy this fire season has been, he got a phone call.
"However, it's been really a ... this is my dispatcher calling right now. 'Hey, Mike.' They're going to dispatch me again; I'm going to grab the fuel truck and fuel up," he said.
After filling up, Heffner got back in the pilot's chair and took off to battle another brush fire.
The smoke from the fire in Luzerne County near Crystal Lake in Bear Creek Township could be seen for miles.
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