An Airbus A319 destined for modification into a prototype air tanker for aerial firefighting specialist Neptune Aviation Services has arrived in Dothan, Alabama, for conversion work by maintenance, modification and refurbishment company Commercial Jet.
Flown to the U.S. from storage in Spain, the former Braathens Regional Airlines aircraft will be modified into a tanker with a capacity for up to 4,500 gal. of retardant–a 50% increase over the 3,000 gal. provided by the BAe 146-200 based tankers that Neptune currently operates.
Neptune believes the A319 will be a flexible future tanker option with up to 15% faster transit speeds than the 146, increasing mission capacity. The A319 also has a greater range and fuel capacity, which will allow operations in more remote areas with fewer refueling stops.
The design—which is being developed in concert with Toulouse-based modification company Aerotec & Concept and Michigan-based computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis specialists Airflow Sciences Corp.—incorporates two independent tanks housed on the main deck positioned fore and aft of the main wing spar.
“We’ve worked with them to refine the shape of the tanks, the venting system and the gating system to take as much of the guesswork out as we can,” says Nic Lynn, vice president of Operations for Neptune. “It’s one of those things that, until you build and fly it and drop it, you don’t really know if it’s going to flow the way you want it to,” he adds.
“So, we’ve gone into the CFD modeling very heavily,” Lynn says. “That technology has come a long way since we did our 146 back in the 2010s, so we have a high level of assurance that things will work as planned. However, we are building a full-scale test bench, a mockup tank here at our facility in Montana, where we will do some validation flow runs.”
The mockup will also be used to finalize sensors and fitting locations ahead of production of the flight tank unit. Construction of the first forward tank is now underway. “We’re hoping to start running water through that, probably late August or early September is the target right now,” Lynn adds.
The mockup will also be used to validate tank components. “Hopefully we can get a lot of the programming and fine-tuning of the tanking system done before we even have the airplane converted, so we can cut down that time on the back end for tuning the tank,” Lynn says.
Pending completion of the airframe modification over the summer, Neptune aims to conduct flight testing with FAA and Forest Service approvals in late 2027. “We probably won’t be flying on fires until 2028,” says Lynn, who acknowledges the company’s original plan to be operational with the A319 next year was “always a little aggressive.” Neptune says it will perform test flights in the coming weeks and expects Commercial Jet to complete modifications of the aircraft within 18 months.
For follow-on A319 tanker modification, Lynn says “we are not really worried about the pipeline and potential platforms. At this stage, we’re going to focus on getting this first one out the door and making sure we’ve got everything figured out. Then we’ll ramp up production after that.” Initial follow-on modifications are expected to get underway in 2028-2029.
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