The Barrhead Fire Department is donating its old equipment to benefit a South American country, and they are getting a platform truck.
County of Barrhead councillors voted on Friday, April 15, during a special meeting to accept Barrhead Fire Chief John Whittaker’s recommendations to donate the department’s existing and aging self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) equipment to the country of Guyana, located in South America, after Whittaker said he attended a four-week training exercise with other departments from across North and Central Alberta, adding the instructor was a consultant for the other country.
Guyana is going through a major national reorganization of their services, Whittaker said, adding he and the other department heads present made a decision to offer their department’s aging equipment to Guyana’s fire department.
“It’s great because the whole country got reorganized with the help of Albertan fire chiefs,” he added.
Under normal circumstances, because the fire department’s SCBAs have expired under current national fire protection association (NFPA) compliances, the older equipment would typically be cut up or similarly destroyed and then thrown away Whittaker said.
According to the fire chief, Guyana’s firefighters combat blazes in little more than coveralls, shorts, and sandals.
“They don’t have any proper equipment at all, except at their international airport, and there are 17 departments across the country that are sharing one set of bunker gear per person between their staff members,” he said, adding it was difficult to imagine fighting fires in those kinds of conditions.
“What we throw away is better than the best equipment the Guyana fire department has at their disposal,” Whittaker told councillors, adding Barrhead’s fire department was recently approved for new SCBAs and while the older equipment could potentially be sold, the liability for the department would be astronomical.
“At the last fire committee meeting, a motion was made to donate it to Guyana, and they [the Guyana government] will pay for shipping. This equipment will be good for their firefighters for the next ten years.
It is a huge step for them and a minimal loss for us,” he said.
At the same meeting, county councillors reached an agreement with the Town of Barrhead to move forward with the proposed purchase of a 2007 Pierce 100’ Platform fire truck located in Huntsville, Alabama, at a cost of $699,780, pending an inspection at the border following discussions with Whittaker.
The funding, county manager Mark Oberg said, comes from a recently approved APC grant and pre-existing reserves.
“With the grant of $350,000 being approved from the provincial government, the direction I was given by the fire committee was to look for a decent second-hand truck that was reasonably priced, and it had to have a minimum of 10 years left in it,” Whittaker said, adding while he searched multiple venues, the platform truck council voted on was purchased by Pierce from a department that had a replacement handy. “The price is not written in stone and if we feel it isn’t worth the sticker price, we will try to haggle them down,” he said. “It has to be winterized and there are some other things that need to be done but Pierce will take care of anything that needs to be done.”
The platform truck is not just a piece of equipment that will sit around and not get used, Whittaker said, adding with a 2,000 gallon per minute pump capacity, the new truck will more than double the department’s capabilities in the field.
County council voted unanimously in support of the motions.
