(The following editorial appeared in the Monday edition of the Missoula Missoulian and is reprinted with permission -- ed.)

Neptune Aviation flies aerial tankers that were built for war to combat hellish wildfires, but their toughest mission ever appears to be navigating a federal bureaucracy that grounded the Missoula-based firefighting force pending near-absolute proof that its aging but well-maintained aircraft are airworthy.

In May, the US Forest Service and Department of the Interior abruptly canceled contracts with Neptune and several other air tanker companies providing a total of 33 large planes used to dump retardant on wildfires throughout the West. That decision followed an investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board of two aerial tanker crashes in 2002. The decision to cancel the contracts was based not on any hard evidence that the air tanker force isn't safe. Rather, it was the NTSB's declaration that airworthiness needed to be assured through a more thorough oversight program - and that the Forest Service is responsible for ensuring airworthiness. Previously, the Forest Service believed that was the Federal Aviation Administration's job.

Interestingly, the NTSB report didn't single out heavy air tankers. Its findings applied to any and all aircraft hired by the Forest Service. The Forest Service may be focusing on the large tankers because they are mostly older ex-military planes subjected to potentially great stresses in fighting fires. But the selective reading - or at least application - of the NTSB findings has a lot of us scratching our heads.

What's transpired since the contract cancellation has been much like ping-pong played through a smoke screen. The Forest Service has struggled to detail the information it needs to determine airworthiness. Neptune has turned itself inside out to provide it. A clean bill of health from the contractor hired by the Forest Service to evaluate Neptune's planes and maintenance wasn't enough. Now the Forest Service says it also needs data about the "operational life limit" - essentially, the life span of the plane established by the manufacturer when the planes were built. Or not. Operational life limits may not exist for all planes. Manufacturer Lockheed Martin is now working to produce the data the Forest Service is demanding. This all seems aimed at proving a negative - not that the planes are safe but, rather, that they absolutely aren't unsafe.

In the meantime, a relatively tame fire season has muted the fallout from the lack of large air tankers for firefighting. The agency has instead relied on other aircraft. Success in fire suppression has been high, but four single-engine tankers have crashed this season. Only the large tankers have been grounded, however.

We don't know much about airplanes - certainly nothing about metallurgical stresses, operational life limits and other technical issues needed to certify planes as airworthy. Our guess is that, as an agency, the Forest Service knows next to nothing. The Forest Service is a land- and resource-management agency. Much of the difficulty and confusion involving the canceled air tanker contracts might be attributable to the fact that the Forest Service is trying to reinvent the wheel.

The NTSB may be legally correct when it assigns the Forest Service responsibility for ensuring airworthiness of aircraft. But surely that's a job that could be better done by the FAA. Congress ought to legislate a change clarifying the FAA has jurisdiction over so-called public-use aircraft hired by the Forest Service, if not all government agencies.

Last week, Forest Service officials said they're going to work on plans to modernize the planes used for firefighting. Sounds expensive as all get-out! Even if Congress antes up the money to do that, surely it would be years before the agency realizes that goal. Even then, the aircraft used to fight fires likely would be newer, but not new. Airworthiness of the aircraft it owns and employs will be an ongoing issue.

It seems wasteful to divert precious resources and occupy a land-management agency with the task of creating, maintaining, evaluating and certifying its own air force.

The Forest Service needs the ability to fight fires from the air as part of the combined attack it needs to manage wildlands and protect the public. Private companies have proved highly capable in providing that capability under contract. The Forest Service needs the planes it employs to be safe, and the contractors need a reasonable and predictable opportunity to certify their aircraft. The FAA certifies other commercial aircraft, and it seems silly to create redundant capability within the Forest Service.

FMI: www.missoulian.com