Helping in that fight is Albuquerque-based 10 Tanker. Its fleet consists of four DC-10 tanker planes that can each hold and drop a massive 9,500 gallons of fire retardant. Two of them – Tanker ...

10 Tanker expects to have its third airplane up and running by the end of this week.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Captain RK Smithley, a pilot flying McDonnell Douglas DC-10 widebody airliners converted into tanker planes for a New Mexico-based company ...

“My gut reaction was it’s a nightmare.” A Ligonier native, Smithley, 65, who lives in Tennessee, works for 10 Tanker, an aerial firefighting organization. He flies a DC-10 Air Tanke ...