Voters at an upcoming special town meeting will be asked to approve funding for major repairs on the Fire Department's ladder truck, which was found during routine maintenance to have severe corrosion.
The cost of the project is estimated at up to $350,000, Deputy Fire Chief Chris O'Brien told the Selectboard recently. The truck has been sidelined since October, requiring the town to rely on mutual aid from Pittsfield or Great Barrington in case a ladder is needed.
Although the ailing truck is 20 years old, the repair is expected to give it up to 10 more years of life, O'Brien said.
The cost to replace the "severely damaged" aluminum frame will not increase taxes nor will it disrupt longer-range capital improvement needs, Town Manager Christopher Ketchen said.
He noted that voters at last May's annual town meeting already had appropriated $650,000 for the purchase of a new engine for one of its pumper trucks.
Based on meetings with department staff, consultants and the town's Capital Improvement Committee, the town manager proposed diverting $350,000 from the funds set aside for the pumper truck project in order to repair the ladder truck. In addition, the plan calls for advancing $175,000 from "free cash" into the pumper truck fund.
O'Brien said the pumper can likely last at least another year, so town meeting voters could be asked in 2017 to approve $125,000 more to bring the pumper repair fund back up to $650,000.
If voters approve the fund transfers, the project would "bring the ladder truck back into service as soon as possible, it does not raise taxes and it does not in any way disrupt the overall capital improvement plan," Ketchen said.
O'Brien said that during last October's routine maintenance, a "substantial deficiency" was found with the frame caused by corrosion. In the view of several contractors who viewed the truck, he said, "it isn't driveable and you shouldn't have been using it to begin with."
"This threw everybody for a loop," O'Brien said. "Nobody was as shocked as we were."
A fire apparatus contractor, Colden Enterprises, in Tonawanda, N.Y., supplied the $350,000 estimate for the three-month repair job after examining the equipment.
The project is complicated by space restrictions at the central fire station, O'Brien noted, thus requiring a "labor-intensive" repair. The only other option, the deputy chief learned, would be to scrap the truck, which would yield only about $30,000 for the town. A new ladder truck likely would cost close to $1 million, he said.
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Posted: Jan 18, 2016
A town of Harrison fire truck suffered significant damage to its front end after it slid down a steep, icy private road and rolled over Sunday afternoon.
Town Manager George "Bud" Finch said the driver, veteran volunteer firefighter Maurice Kautz, suffered minor cuts and bruises but was not seriously injured.
However, the amount of damage sustained by Engine 4 was significant, Finch said. He said the town will need to figure out some way to replace the first response engine on a temporary basis until the damage can be fixed. The firetruck was fully insured.
According to Finch, Engine 4 was sent to Harrison Heights Road around 11:55 a.m. to investigate a report of a carbon monoxide detector going off in a home in a private development located on top of a hill overlooking the lakes region.
Finch said the road had been plowed, but "limited" amounts of sand had been spread over it. It was determined that the carbon monoxide detector had malfunctioned.
Engine 4 was returning to the fire station when Kautz started to lose control of the truck. He applied the brakes, but Engine 4 continued to slide down Harrison Heights Road and across Route 35, where it rolled over into a wooded area.
Finch said Engine 4's front chassis sustained heavy damage but there was very little, if any, damage to the truck's firefighting apparatus, located at the rear of the vehicle. Engine 4 is a 2002 model firetruck.
For more information, view www.pressherald.com
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Posted: Jan 18, 2016
By Mike Ciampo
Columbus New Jersey is an unincorporated community located in Mansfield Township, Burlington County, New Jersey. Columbus is the main business district of the township and is also home to its main government offices. The town was originally called Black Horse after a tavern but was later changed to Columbus, after Christopher Columbus, when the area was renaming sections of the county. The town is nestled just off of the New Jersey Turnpike, south of the state capital of Trenton and east of the Delaware River. It is a suburb of the City of Philadelphia to its west and it also has easy access to New York City via commuter trains and Route 95. There are a few major roadways that run through the fire department’s response area that encounter vehicle extrications throughout the year. Columbus also has an area of farmland in its response area, which can lead to farm accidents, such as tractor roll-overs or man in the machine incidents. The town is also home to a famous Farmer’s Market which started years ago and is still operational in multiple buildings today.
Franklin Fire Company 1 has been operaring for over 150 years and is now known as Station 33 according to the Mansfield Township/Burlington County numbering system. It was organized around 1828 and reorganized in 1860 according to its Web site. The Web site (www.mansfieldfire.com) also has a nice section of older apparatus under its history tab, which shows some vintage photos of a Martin fire engine with solid rubber tires, chain-driven with chemical tanks in 1914 and photos of their 1930 and 1935 Fords and 1970 Ford/Hahn engines in front of the firehouse over the years.
Today the department operates out of a station on Route 206 that houses two Pierce Engines with 1,000-gallon tanks and top-mounted pump controls; one Ford 4 Guys single-axle water tender carrying 2,000 gallons; one four-wheel-drive Ford 350 extended cab Brush pickup truck; one International four-door crew cab with PL Custom body and rescue and lighting apparatus; one Ford commercial cab support service vehicle for the fire police; and two Chevrolet SUVs for the chief and fire marshal. The newest addition to its fleet is a 2014 Pierce Quantum Rescue apparatus.
Rescue 3318 is a 2014 Pierce Quantum combination heavy-duty rescue with a 22-inch raised roof that sits six firefighters. It has an Allison EV4000 P automatic transmission, Hale APSH50 500-gpm pump, Detroit DD13 500-hp engine, 500 gallon water tank, and Oshkosh TAK-4 independent suspension system. The apparatus is equipped with roll-up compartment doors and painted red with the exception of the top of the cab’s roof which is white. The cab also has two gold leaf lines that run along the base of the cab and just below the windows. There is a wide, black reflective stripe running down the side of the vehicle outl
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Posted: Jan 18, 2016
Charlton (NY) Volunteer Fire Department, rescue-pumper. 1871W cab and chassis; Cummins ISL9 450-hp engine.
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