Since the department officially took delivery of the truck in September, Whittaker said it has been used in a number of situations people wouldn't normally associate it with -- from structure fires to accidents. When the councils, through the fire services committee, first started to consider replacing the ladder truck they decommissioned about five years ago, they were concerned about committing such a large amount of funds to a piece of equipment that would be used only sporadically.

Besides giving crews the ability to gain access to the taller structures such as Klondike Place, the elevators and a number of apartment buildings in town, the aerial truck has a number of built-in capabilities, which will make firefighters more effective and keep them safer on the job. Attached to the 105-foot ladder, is a basket with a 1,000-pound capacity, which gives firefighters a working platform to work from, in large part because they can access water and air from the basket.

The basket also has connections for power and hoses and it actually has its own nozzle that sprays 1,500 gallons of water per minute.

In addition, T6 holds 500 gallons of water and has a 100-gallon tank of special encapsulating foam, which is particularly useful in battling house, or petroleum fires. Another benefit of the aerial truck is the added capability in combating fires in large buildings that are not necessarily tall, but long and wide. "Anything that has a large surface area, such as our grocery stores, downtown building blocks and our schools, if there is a fire, we would call out the ladder truck," he said, adding many rural buildings fall into the same category. Because currently T6 is the only aerial truck in the region the BFD expects other fire departments to request it as part of their mutual-aid agreements.