After hundreds of hours of research by firefighters in the department to compile its specifications and work with the manufacturer, a 2018 Sutphen fire engine is now in service and will be housed at Station 4 on Mt. Bethel Road.

The facility, which will be known as Fire Station No. 1, will be a 15,561 square-foot building designed as a hub for first responders with space for firefighter and emergency medical service training as well as programs and classes for the public. Fire Chief Rob Wight said the project will cost about $5.2 million, which will be covered by a levy passed last year.  

Ground-breaking for the facility is scheduled to take place at 6 p.m. Wednesday at the site of the former Lincoln Elementary School, 911 E. Third St., Monroe.

The station was designed by Redstone Architects of Bloomfield Hills and will be under the construction management of AUCH Construction of Pontiac. The current building, Chief Wight said, is 50 years old and can’t handle all of the training and programs that the fire department wants and needs to do.

The fire department’s contingent of firefighting vehicles such as ladder trucks and pumpers are perfectly adequate for dealing with a house fire but this deluge was something else completely. KFD trucks were simply not high enough.

 

A few hours later, Katy residents with boats began showing up at the station and offering to help. Wilson gladly took them up on the officer.

 

One resident with an airboat that can skim across the surface of the water told Katy officials one of his rescue missions in the Old Katy area was especially tough.

Pumper 63, a unit out of Station 6 in Nottawa, is getting a pink wrap and going ‘on tour’ throughout the township to raise awareness about cancer.  

“Raising money for cancer is important to everyone; everyone knows one or two people who have been affected by cancer in one way or another,” said Tammy Knowler, who is leading the 12-member committee of the township’s crew of paid, on-call firefighters who have spearheaded the wrap project.  

Part of the work included approaching local businesses to sponsor cost of the wrapping. That part, it turned out, was likely the easiest, with 10 businesses jumping on board, at $500 each, almost as soon as the committee got off the ground.