WA Department of Fire and Emergency Services (6AR and 6IP) (Including the Fire Services, SES & VMRS) and Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions
here is one for you all. Why does it taking so long for FESA to replace the pumps within the Metro area. I hear that most of the heavy pumps have been replaced but the likes of Career stations like Midland, Malaga, Armadale, Murdoch and Succuss are driving around in trucks that are 10 to 18 years old. What is taking so long for these truck to be built. My thought would be to send the contract over to the CFA in Victoria and get them to seed the process. Sorry guys I know you are all mostly Vols on here but, being a site for WA Fire Appliances somebody might know or have there hand in the pie?? You see these old series 3 rolling around and think, what the hell is the ESL paying...... makes me wonder. Keep safe out there guys.
Not sure on strategies for release of pumps. I do know however that Midland should in the next month or so be receiving the prototype of the new Urban Pump which is a Heavy Pump equivelant and then these will be rolled out to other stations as required so that hopefully once the rollout is done all pumps will be the same, though some may have extended duration BA capabilities and/or Heavy Rescue equipment in the trucks too.
Stirling SES
Team Leader (Stirling 53)
Vertical Rescue Team Member
K9 7 Support
VK6FWDH
ex-Darlington FB
WARSUG Demi-God I mean Mod
If stupidity got me into this mess, why can't it get me out.
macca wrote:You see these old series 3 rolling around and think, what the hell is the ESL paying...... makes me wonder. Keep safe out there guys.
Probably those lovely Landcruiser Wagons and Subaru Forresters that you see driving around. Had two "lecturers" do fire safety lecture at a primary school, both driving forresters, both carrying laptops and conducted the fire safety course with the kids together and the laptops never left the case. I am sure they could have shared a car and the laptop.
The money for the extra car and laptop must be duplicated further within FESA, so I am sure they could dump the extras and put the money to front line equipment.
The CFRS pumps are ment to be on a 15yr replacement which is 5 yrs too long in my opinion. A lot of the ESL money has been spent on upgrading the ageing BFS and VFRS fleet as well as some new appliances for the CFRS and building new stations. You are right there are alot of people driving around in path finders and forresters that really don't require them especially when there are alot of substandard front line vehicles being used across the state.
I would say that at $500,000 plus per pumper there is only so many they can replace a year. There is also some 1,200 career staff and 30,000 volunteers that FESA supports across WA not to mention an uncountable number of consumable items (one example is black plastic and rope for the SES). As has been mentioned already some of the BFS appliances were in worse condition that the pumpers, and some of the VFRS appliances didnt meet the requirements of the brigades. I was talking to someone from FESA who's opinion was that the LP appliance was a complete failure. So the ESL stretches across alot of things.
Don't get me wrong, i hate seeing the old FRS appliances rolling around still, but if they are still in working order, and there is something else that is in a greater need of replacement, then it should get priority.
Ace, they are all fleet vehicles so they are replaced when they get to their time or Kms, but yes, there are too many of them when there are other vehicles in need of replacement.
Bungarra, from what i have been told some of those forresters are "department cars" so for instance, say the School Aged Education section might have 1 forrester that all the staff have acess to for FESA purposes.
I know that some career staff actually take a pay cut to have the privilege of driving their car.
MELVILLE 80
The worst in nature brings out the best in us! STATEEMERGENCYSERVICE WE SERVE
Is there somewhere that lists the different types of Fire appliances. I'm sure there was a thread somewhere but cannot seem to get the search function to work.
Example. 3.4U or LT etc what does the 3.4 stand for and the U etc.
Maybe a sticky or a glossary would help.
Terms such as BA and DBA etc I can sometimes work out but other terms leave me baffled.
if you have any futher questions about it let me know as we are currently going through the manual for this appliance.[/quote]
Isnt this appliance based as a BFS vechile, not that of the 1.4Rescue as per above?[/quote]
essentially yes. it has no rescue gear on it at all and is pretty much a big red light tanker. i could not find a reference to the "RU" anywhere in the trk for it. The monitour and 1500L of water as well as the ability to go off road has come in handy a lot so far this season and it is certainly a step up from the Mazda Lp we have which now mainly gets used for training or ferrying relief crews around. from our experiances at the last few incidents we have put a pair of BA sets on the 1.4 as we really could of used them in toodyay.
I have heard people talking about a 1.4 rescue in production but it is not the vehicle at bassendean
New LED light bar for LT's looks good, saw the Wangara LT today at a crash on Marmion Ave.
The only query i have is that as it was daytime the blue LED's were no where near as bright as the reds but i'm sure at night time this wouldn't be a problem.