By Alan M. Petrillo

Monahans (TX) Fire Rescue, the largest fire department in the northeast part of Ward County, TX, covers a mostly rural area heavily populated by oil fields and oil and natural gas rigs. The department needed to replace a bread-truck type rescue with a more modern apparatus, and one that had off-road four-wheel-drive capabilities to handle the rough terrain the department responds in.

“The oil and gas industry is very big locally,” says Randy Crabtree, Monahans Fire Rescue’s chief. “The oil fields are really busy with a lot of traffic in and out, and we are seeing big, heavy truck wrecks on almost a daily basis,” Crabtree observes. “We needed to be able to respond well to those incidents and our old bread truck rescue was not up to doing the job properly. So we looked at rescue trucks from several manufacturers, and ultimately chose SVI Trucks because of the quality of the vehicles it builds, and the service from our local dealer.”

Crabtree notes that Monahans Fire Rescue covers 40 square miles with 41 volunteer firefighters from a single station. It’s fleet, besides the new medium rescue, includes two Type 1 engines, two Type 6 wildland engines, and four ex-military 6×6 brush trucks.

Smeal—Detroit (MI) Fire Department 100-foot rear-mount aerial (UR-100’). Spartan Gladiator cab and chassis; Cummins X12 500-hp engine; Darley 1 ½ AG 150-gpm auxiliary pump; UPF Poly 300-gallon water tank. Dealer: Ricke Rosselle, R&R Fire Truck Repair Inc., Northville, MI.

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