Dubbed a "super pumper," the fireboat is capable of pumping more than  16,000 gpm of water or firefighting foam, projected up to 300’. With six fire monitors and 26 manifold valves, the Jensen Maritime-designed vessel is a big step up in power from typical II fireboats, usually equipped with four fire monitors and eight manifold valves and a 10,000 gpm capacity.

The new boat has dual missions. Along with fighting waterfront fires, it is a critical backup in case an earthquake disrupts the city’s water mains. As a mobile pumping station, it can move millions of gallons of water directly from the bay into the city’s auxiliary water system for firefighting in the streets.

Fireboat 3, as it is currently designated, will be christened with a formal name Oct. 17 – also the anniversary of the destructive 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake that broke city water mains.

The city’s older fireboats exceed a half-century in age, and despite meticulous maintenance their systems are getting old, Raymond Guzman, deputy chief of administration for the SFFD, said during construction last year.

An array of Cummins engines provide pumping and propulsion power. Three QSK19-M US EPA Tier 3 engines provide 750 hp at 1,800 rpm to Counterfire ESF 300-550 pumps with capacity of 6,000 gpm each – for a total 18,000 gpm of flow with all three engines in pumping mode.

Power is transmitted to the pumps via three Logan LC318 SAE #0 air actuated clutches and Elbe cardan shafts with a Centa Centaflex-R flywheel mounted torsional coupling.

In addition to pumping power, the two outboard engines also provide 591 hp at 1,800 rpm for propulsion off the front of the engines, transmitted through a Centa CX-56 torsional coupling and a Reintjes WAF 364 reduction gear provided by Karl Senner.

Designers gave special attention to noise and vibration reduction, mounting all three engines on Christie & Grey TSC T-10 vibration isolators.

Beachwood Fire Department Chief Patrick Kearns, said the initial cost was actually $1.5 million more, but changes were made to the original plan to cut costs. Kearns felt that almost $10 million was "ridiculous."

Council members told Kearns that they relied on his experience to determine what features would be needed in a new fire station. Once approved, construction could begin as soon as next spring.

Kearns has long been an advocate for the replacement of fire station number two, stating that it was too small and the location was not conducive to a quick response for the growing southern part of the city.

The city also needs to consider the changing role of firefighters -- with the addition of ambulance calls -- since the station was built in 1920, officials said.

Deputy Fire Chief David Groder noted all the city's fire stations were built before responding to EMS calls with ambulances and other rescue vehicles was part of the Fire Department's role. Now, he said, EMS calls make up about 80 percent of the 5,000 calls a year the department gets seeking help.

The building at the head of Rines Hill, above the south end of the city's downtown, would be expanded on the east side of the site, onto land already owned by the city. Also, officials said, it probably would require the discontinuance of the short section of Gage Street that now provides access from just off Memorial Bridge to Water Street.

The city's largest, heaviest firetrucks would be kept in the addition, in two large drive-through bays and two smaller back-in bays; while the existing four smaller bays would be used to park ambulances, pickup trucks and other lighter, smaller pieces of equipment.

A $4 million fire station is under construction at the intersection of Leighton Road and Anthony Avenue to serve the north Augusta area. Hartford is expected to remain the city's main fire station after construction of the new station is complete.

The city already has at least two firetrucks -- an engine and a ladder truck -- that can't be kept at Hartford because they're too big and heavy. The trucks now are kept at the Western Avenue station, and the city in January expects to take delivery of a new multipurpose ladder firetruck, which also won't fit inside Hartford.

Officials said the station is in an ideal location, on top of a hill overlooking the city it was built to protect. A 2008 Matrix Consulting Group study concluded Hartford Station is ideally located to be the city's central fire station.

"This is the best site. We're able to go left, right, or straight up Green Street, and hit all the neighborhoods," Groder said. "It was put there for a reason."

Thursday, in a meeting beginning at 7 p.m. in council chambers at Augusta City Center, councilors are scheduled to vote, in an agenda item sponsored by all council members, on whether to send the proposal to bond $6 million to renovate and roughly double the size of the station to voters in a citywide referendum. Councilors expressed support for it at their most recent meeting.

"Hartford Station has served us well," Ward 3 Councilor Patrick Paradis said. "It met the necessities of 1920. But now it's totally different." He said EMS calls weren't even part of what firefighters responded to from Hartford Station over its first several decades.