APPARATUS DELIVERIES
Homewood, Illinois is primarily a residential community of 20,000 people with commercial and light industry. It has a combination fire department of 15 paid and 35 paid/on-call personnel.
Member Raymond Presnak says that the department’s current rescue vehicle is an equipment support unit that answers all fire calls to provide air, lights, and miscellaneous tools. At rescue scenes it provides ice, water, and vehicle rescue equipment.
The truck, built by 3-D Fire Apparatus on a Pemfab Model T-942A tilt-cab chassis, seats five and features thermostatically controlled heat and air-conditioning in both cab and box. The 22-foot aluminum box has a command center within and has 10 interior and 12 exterior compartments.
Major features include a 50-kw PTO-driven Leroy-Somer generator; a 40-foot telescoping light mast capable of 6,000 watts of illumination; four 500-watt inverter run floodlights (two adjustable on cab roof and two telescoping on rear of body); two 1,500-watt recessed floodlights on left and right side of box; three 250-foot electric cord reels, two low-pressure air reels; a 6,000-psi Mako air distribution panel; a front-mounted 6-ton electric winch; and slideout shelving in compartments. Hath compartment also has multilevel lighting and flow-through ventilation.
Circle No. I on Reader Service Card
Fleetwood, Pennsylvania, with the surrounding area covered by its fire department, has a population of about 10,000. The borough consists of residential and industrial areas.
Fire Chief Ricky C. Moyer says since the nearest aerial device was some seven miles away and neighboring fire departments had purchased pumpers and tankers, they decided to purchase a quint to fill the need for an aerial device in the area. According to the chief, the quint was designed with personnel safety in mind, and it takes minimal manpower to put it in operation.
The Fleetwood volunteer department operates this unit built by LTI and mounted on a Spartan Gladiator chassis with 10-man tilt cab and 213-inch wheelbase. The body has eight tool compartments (five on the driver side, three on the officer side). The two-stage. 1,500gpm pump is a Waterous Mode! CMl -YBX featuring a 5-inch front intake and a 5-inch right side discharge. A 4-inch pipe feeds a preconnected, tailboard-mounted Elkhart “Stinger” appliance.
The 75-foot, 3-section ladder has an Alkron Gemini ladderpipe with a 1,000-gpm nozzle. It is fed through a 4-inch pipe. Two 500watt Kwik-Raze floodlights are mounted on the fly section tip. A 277 cubic foot air cylinder is mounted on each side of the ladder for supplying both the turntable and the ladder tip. With the aerial in operation, the outrigger spread is 16 feet.
Other features and equipment include 1,200 feet of 5-inch supply hose, four crosslays for 1 ¾-ineh attack lines, one 3-inch rear discharge reduced for 2-inch preconnected attack line, two 1,500watt Kwik-Raze body-mounted floodlights, and an Onan 7.5-kw diesel generator. (Photo by Daniel Decher.)
Circle No. 2 on Reader Service Card
A fire truck with cruise control? This pumper in Strathcona County. Alberta, Canada has it in order to cover 90 square miles of farms and small acreage. The area served has a population of 8,000 and contains a four-lane highway, Canadian National Railroad tracks (40 trains per day), and four schools.
The new pumper is built by Superior on a Volvo-White WCM-42 chassis, which has a 267-inch wheelbase and total seating for six. The module behind the cab carries four firefighters and is weatherized for – 40°F to 70°F. It is equipped with air-conditioning.
The waterous single-stage pump is rated for 1,050 Igpm, and 700 gallons of water is carried. The pumper has top-mount control enclosed within the crew module.
Grde No. 3 on Reader Service Card
The Alpine Fire Protection District in California recently placed in service a pair of Hurricane pumpers built by Emergency One. Special features include motor vents through the roof, a Sigtronics intercom system, an Intec backup camera, and dual Stang monitors.
The pumpers have 169-inch wheelbases and four-door cabs that seat six. Six roll-up compartments on the vehicle body, an enclosed ladder rack, and 83 feet of ground ladders are included.
The pumps are Hale QSMG single-stage 1,500-gpm featuring a four-inch pipe, which by the flip of a switch can become either an intake or a discharge. Preconnects include six 1 ½-inch (two front bumper, two crosslays, two right rear) and one 2’A inch (right rear). One each of the front and rear preconnects can be switched from water to foam if desired. A 50-gallon foam tank and a 500-gallon water tank are featured.
The two monitors are fed directly from the pump by three-inch pipe and are equipped with Akron #1755 Turbomaster nozzles. The units carry 1,000 feet of four-inch hose each. Chief Woody Downing explains that the tail steps were eliminated to increase the angle of leparture.
Other equipment includes a 6-kw Onan diesel generator, which can be operated from the cab or pump panel, two 1,500and two 500-watt floodlights, a reel of 200 feet of electric cord and 150 feet of air hose, a Hurst tool, and a full complement of EMS equipment including a defibrillator.
Circle No. 4 on Reader Service Card
The Jersey City, New Jersey Fire Department operates 18 engines and 11 ladder trucks and protects a population of 250,000 within 15 square miles. The city is connected to Manhattan via the Holland Tunnel and is intersected by the New Jersey Turnpike, the U.S. Highway 1 & 9 truck route, state highways 185 and 440, and a stretch of the Pulaski Skyway. The fire department recently placed a haz-mat system in service. The two-piece system consists of a haz-mat pumper, which doubles as a regular line engine with its own first-due district, and a haz-mat equipment truck, which doubles as a floodlight unit.
The pumper, built on a rear-engined Emergency One Hush chassis, serves as the command unit. It has a command cab with raised roof and is equipped with air-conditioning and ceiling lights. The cab has five seats-one at each corner and a center seat that swivels over to a desk on the wall behind the officer’s position. The desk has a cell phone and radio communications plus a hazardous-materials index and a computer.
The unit has a 178-inch wheelbase and nine tool and equipment compartments. A Hale QGT, 1,250-gpm, two-stage pump has a 5-inch front intake, a 5-inch right side discharge, and rear preconnects for attack, The pumper has a 3-inch direct pipe to an Elkhart Stinger gun with 1,000-gpm nozzle and carries 700 feet of 5-inch hose stored recessed in the center hosebed (the vents for the rear engine must be kept clear).
Tlie vehicle has a 40-gallon foam tank and an Elkhart 125-gpm eductor foam line in the crosslay plus a pipe to the deck gun for a 350-gpm foam nozzle. It has an Onan 3-5 kw generator and two 500watt telescoping quartz floodlights mounted forward of the midship booster reel.
The second piece in the Jersey City Fire Department Special Hazards Response Unit is the equipment carrier, which is built by Betten Rol-up on a GMC Topkick chassis with a 230-inch wheelbase. The cab has seating for three.
The carrier, similar in design to a beverage truck, has eight large compartments with roll-up doors, which carry spill containment equipment and protective suits. Included are a Harrison 20-kw hydraulic generator, four electric rewind reels with 250 feet of cord each, and four tripod-mounted 500-watt quartz lights. Two 20-foot telescoping light masts are mounted on the top of the vehicle. The rear of the body is an air-conditioned dressing room for the haz-mat team.
A special feature of the truck is a “backstop” device, which applies the brakes when the vehicle comes in contact with an object while in reverse gear. (Photo by John M. Malecky.)
Grde No. 5 on Reader Servke Gird
