Those sirens you heard coming from the fire hall last Wednesday night weren’t because the fire department was rushing off to a call — they were because the department’s new command/rescue vehicle had arrived.
The new, $302,000 truck arrived at around 7 p.m. on Oct. 5, about three years after the process started to acquire it, said deputy fire chief Les Goertz.
One of the primary reasons the department went out to acquire a new truck was that some current pieces of the fleet are getting up in age and are close to needing replacing, he said.
“It’s just upgrading the fire department,” he said. “You think about how some of this equipment is 30 years old and it starts getting to the point where you ask how much money do you spend on it to keep it running.”
A major feature on the new vehicle is a light tower on the roof, equipped with six lights on it that make it a lot easier to see a scene at night.
It’s something that Goertz said will prove invaluable because the majority of the department’s calls come in when it’s dark. It also would have been useful two weeks ago.
“If we had had it out there at Manola, it would have been ideal to keep track of where everybody was,” he said.
Dubbed Rescue 8, Goertz said the new truck is a replacement for, and upgrade on, the department’s current Rescue 7, which is currently packed to the gills with all the necessary equipment.
Having the new truck will allow the department to bring everything it needs to calls, and have that equipment easily accessible, he said.
In addition, the truck has a large, heated cabin behind the driver’s cab that can be used as a mobile office. Furthermore, for calls in extreme weather, the cabin can also serve as a place for firefighters to rest and either warm up or cool down before going back out to attend to the scene.
There is also a roll-out awning on the passenger side, which can be used to keep firefighters out of the sun or rain.
When the truck arrived, a representative from Rocky Mountain Phoenix, the company that supplied the truck, gave the firefighters in attendance a tour and briefing on the truck and its capabilities.
Before it can enter service, the truck needs to be fully equipped with all the supplies that are currently on Rescue 7. After that, it will start responding to calls, Goertz said.
