“The cost increases, the number of them and the delays are something I have not witnessed before in my time.” — Chief Mike Jones, Fredericksburg Fire Department
Cathy Dyson
The Free Lance-Star, Fredericksburg, Va.
(TNS)
Mar. 29—Fire and rescue departments across the Fredericksburg region — and the nation — are dealing with the double whammy of higher costs and longer wait times for new ambulances and fire trucks.
Here’s a situation that played out recently in King George County: Fire Chief David Moody requested a replacement ambulance in September and initially put in a “placeholder of $300,000 with the disclaimer” that he didn’t know the exact price because the manufacturer hadn’t provided it.
When he got the final cost, Moody came back to the Board of Supervisors because he needed another $34,000.
“Just to give you a little bit of context,” Moody said last week, “this is the same model that we purchased in 2020 for $285,000 … and now the price today is $333,957.”
Wait times for new equipment are going up along with costs. Departments used to get new ambulances or fire apparatus three to six months after they placed an order. Now, the process is taking two to three years.
“It’s a big mess,” said Brian Frankel, deputy chief of EMS for Stafford County Fire and Rescue. “Pretty much every jurisdiction in the commonwealth is dealing with the same challenge.”
Four American and international groups, representing various fire and rescue officials, spelled out the problems with rising costs and wait times, and the risk they pose, in an October letter to U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg.
“This issue is a rapidly emerging threat to public safety,” the letter stated. “The lack of proper equipment puts additional pressure on an EMS system that is already over-stressed.”
The groups included the American Ambulance Association, International Association of Fire Chiefs, International Association of Firefighters and National Association of Emergency Medical Technicians. They said that when an ambulance is totaled in a crash or has put in too many miles, the long wait for a new one makes it harder to ensure timely responses to 911 calls.
Most of the problems are tied to supply chain issues including the global shortage of microchips that’s impacted all automotive production. But the production of the chassis used for ambulances has been particularly hard hit, according to a June article on the Firehouse website.
Manufacturers, such as Ford, GM and Chrysler, typically provide chassis to companies that then assemble ambulances with specifications requested by local fire and rescue departments.
But the companies that assemble the rescue squads have gotten only “a fraction of their orders” in the last 18 months, according to the letter from fire and rescue officials. To compound the problem, the ambulance industry is getting more requests for new equipment.
Before COVID, North American companies were receiving about 6,000 requests a year for new ambulances, according to the letter from fire and rescue associations. In 2021, orders increased to 8,500 a year.
“These are extremely difficult times for buyers, dealers and the manufacturers,” Bob Reilly, owner of one of the largest ambulance dealers in the United States, said in the Firehouse article.
Chief Mike Jones with the Fredericksburg Fire Department has been in fire trucks or ambulances for almost 40 years, and worked to procure them for decades.
“The cost increases, the number of them and the delays are something I