Always pushing forward

Kawak has had a bold and confident year so far. During the recent fires in California, there were 18 Firehawks with Kawak tanks and snorkels battling the fires. In total, there were 1,200 snorkel and tank fills over four days with no failures. Andrew Mills, Vice President of Business Development for Kawak, described how Kawak’s pride and confidence in its products have resulted in this achievement: “We feel that [our products are] a major contributor to firefighting effectiveness, and a testament to the tanks that we build.” He continued: “Even on big campaign fires, you don’t normally fly those kinds of loads hour after hour after hour. We’re pretty proud of the fact that our systems sustained perfectly throughout.”

Mills told AirMed&Rescue that Kawak is dedicated to supporting its S-70 Firehawk customers: every S-70 Firehawk in California has the Kawak tank and snorkel.

BUILDING ON SUCCESS

As well as the continued support for the Firehawks, Mills said that there were orders for five new CH-47 Chinook fire tank systems. These heavy-lift aircraft are an invaluable asset in the battle against wildfires, able to carry huge amounts of water, and with the snorkel from Kawak, these tanks can be filled easily, quickly and efficiently.

THE BUCKET PROGRAM

A program that was started two years previously, the Kawak bucket systems have gathered their own successes for the company. Constantly improving, the Kawak buckets have proven themselves to be capable and desirable in the fight against wildfires. Mills explained the concept behind Kawak’s design process: “Our whole goal at Kawak is to make rugged, reliable, field serviceable equipment.” He gave an example of the success of the current offering: “This last year we sold 30 buckets, all Black Hawk-size buckets – 900gal.” But Kawak is not satisfied to rest on its laurels.

In a venture into a new segment of the market, Mills said: “This year, we redesigned the base to a smaller size, and have come out with a bucket for a medium-sized aircraft: 320–350gal.”

The production and delivery for these new buckets, announced at VERTICON 2025, will commence in April. Interest has been shown particularly from operators in Canada and the USA. Explaining the response to this new product offering in the bucket program, Mills said: “There’s definitely a need for a bucket that’s fairly light, and is rugged and reliable. And we back up every product we sell, we service and support all of our products; the operators really like that.”

Mills said that the decision to enter the bucket market initially with the larger variant was due to the growth in the number of operators getting equipped with Black Hawks, and this helped accelerate Kawak’s bucket program. However, Mills stated that Kawak always knew that they wanted to “build some other sizes and the medium market seemed like the next natural progression”. He added that he’s had lots of people come to ask for a 320gal bucket, with “the same robust equipment and the same valve”, and this has led to the current new product.

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT

Beyond even the medium bucket, the next size, currently in design with the prototype due to be ready in summer 2025, is a smaller 260gal bucket, suitable for lighter helicopters in the Airbus A-Star B3 or Bell 407HP class. Mills said that this design was really being “driven by operator request” as there are “a lot of B3s and 407HPs flying in Canada”. He said that it was a perfect size for these craft and hopes the design will allow for it to fold down and fit on an external rack, with possible delivery of the final product to customers towards the end of 2025.

NEW LEADERSHIP AND THE FUTURE

Mike Reightley has retired as President of Kawak, but will remain in a mentorship role at the company. This change in leadership is not so much a change as an evolution, as Steven Sawyer, Vice President of Engineering, will be taking Reightley’s place, both retaining dependability and consistency at the head of Kawak – Sawyer has been with the company for 17 years – and has advanced the product offering and services that Kawak supplies by being heavily involved in the bucket program from the beginning. Growth, especially in the bucket program, is being sought globally, as Mills explained: “Our push is to start broadening into the European market more and South America, particularly with the bucket program, because that’s a universal product for lots of different helicopter types and different agencies, militaries that get tasked with firefighting in other countries. So we definitely expect to expand into that. Even in Europe, there are additional military aircraft coming into the commercial market. And we’re being used in firefighting and some of our tank systems are applicable to that. So we are making a push to become more global. We sell products now not only in Canada but Australia, New Zealand, and Rotak in Switzerland has one of our buckets. We’re looking at broadening that footprint quite a bit in the next two years.