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• Pingback: Illinois Quint Damaged in Bridge Accident | Firefighters Worldwide Playground

• #1 by Phil R on December 10, 2013 - 4:56 PM

  

  Can we use the photo on the suntimes website?

  • #2 by Admin on December 10, 2013 - 9:07 PM

    

    It’s not our image to offer, it was submitted to us by an anonymous reader

• #3 by Brian on December 4, 2013 - 3:47 PM

  

  Ferrara builds a very nice truck, whether engine (pumper) or aerial

• #4 by Dennis on December 4, 2013 - 9:46 AM

  

  @ ffpm571, Forest Parks station back half is from the old village hall built earlier in the 1900’s. In the 60’s they added on to the front so the crown snorkel would fit. Later they added the second floor above that section. If you climb up the scuttle ladder you will find =many different levels of the ceiling as you go up to the original roof level.

• #5 by Bill Post on December 4, 2013 - 12:08 AM

  

  Here is where you can find the low profile 102 foot Aerial Ladder that Ferrara sells.
  http://www.ferrarafire.com/Apparatus/Aerials/LP102/LP102.html

• #6 by Bill Post on December 4, 2013 - 12:04 AM

  

  Ferrara has a low profile Aerial Ladder chassis and they will sell you a 102 foot rearmounted Aerial Ladder on the chassis with a 10 ft 10 in height clearance if the ladder has a prepipped waterway and if you buy the Ladder without a waterway the clearance is as low as 10 ft 4 inches on their low profile cab and chassis. That is something worth looking at.

• #7 by ffpm571 on December 3, 2013 - 8:42 PM

  

  Since when has Forest Park,or River forest, had a station that dates back to 1900’s?

• #8 by DMc77 on December 3, 2013 - 8:39 PM

  

  To start with, this is directly from members of the RFFD – the driver of the truck when the incident happened is a senior, and well respected member of the dept… He was on his way to get fuel, driving alone. This is per their normal procedures. He drove the route he drove for many, many years and made a mistake. This humbled him, as well as the rest of a normally quiet department. We can say and speculate all we want about viaduct heights and repaving, but the bottom line is there is the human factor.

  As for the truck, it will be flat bedded back to Smeal for evaluation as to repairs. This will happen as soon as possible given the situation. Repair estimates I have heard range from $100-300K.

  And FOPK’s Oshkosh/LTI was a real beauty. As Scott mentioned the reason for its purchase was clearance issues at the firehouse. It was always something to see that thing roll down the street with the drivers head lower than the front wheel!

• #9 by Scott on December 3, 2013 - 7:16 PM

  

  Grumpy: Yes Forest Park had an Oshkosh LTI/Pierce low level tower ladder. It was replaced by a mid-ship mount Pierce tower ladder. THE REAL AND MAIN reason is these are the only apparatus that fit in the firehouse which goes back to the early 1900’s. That is how the trucks have been spec’d.

• #10 by NJ on December 3, 2013 - 6:51 PM

  

  If the bridge clearance sign says 11′ 0″ and the rig is 11′ 9″ it’s hard to see how paving could have been the issue.

• #11 by Adam on December 3, 2013 - 5:03 PM

  

  Please correct me if I am wrong but I am hearing that the road was recently paved and was possibly not measured to ensure accuracy of the sign on the viaduct.

• #12 by grumpy grizzly on December 3, 2013 - 3:55 PM

  

  Didn’t Forest Park have a low level Oshosh rig?

• #13 by grumpy grizzly on December 3, 2013 - 3:45 PM

  

  Everyone knows Boston is a great department. Well they did the same thing with a demo, Pierce I think. They were responding to call well outta their still district and got squished on Storrow Drive. Think they ended up buying it!

• #14 by NJ on December 3, 2013 - 3:18 PM

  

  Article on this. Not sure how accurate the facts are, but it’s the first I’ve seen.

  http://www.oakpark.com/News/Articles/12-2-2013/New-River-Forest-fire-engine-damaged-in-viaduct-collision/

• #15 by Drew on December 3, 2013 - 2:09 PM

  

  Was Slick Willy Daugherty Driving that rig? This isn’t the first Department he’s destroyed.

• #16 by DMc77 on December 3, 2013 - 12:01 AM

  

  Bill -River Forest staffs their truck with a driver to follow the engine in town, and they will go out of town with a full crew if called mutual aid. As far as the agreement with Oak Park it was supposed to end next summer when Oak Park’s new tower ladder arrives and the cureent shared tower ladder is disposed of, the sale price to be split between the two agencies. Although could we now see the current OP/RF truck go to River Forest as their full time truck once Oak Park’s new apparatus arrives…? Time will have to tell on that one.

  Your comment about the three depts. (OP RF FP) becoming a fire protection district – let’s just say that every decade or so a trustee, village president or board member wonders that same idea out loud and it becomes the gossip of the day. It’s been looked at before and not acted upon yet. There are a great many issues (as one would expect) that would need ironing out, and in the end it would probably only save money as a few management positions are eliminated. All three depts. are running with bare bones staffing as it is and there would be now firehouse closures. But over the years the idea has sprouted many, many conversations and speculations at the kitchen table…..

• #17 by Bill Post on December 2, 2013 - 8:30 PM

  

  There is no question the River Forest will either have to get a “low profile” Aerial Ladder Truck or a mid mount altogether. As River Forest is a small suburb they really don’t have that many streets that pass under the Union Pacific railroad tracks and the measurements of the underpass and the new Truck company should have been done ahead of time. So I agree that the management would be just a culpable as the driver if not even more culpable then the driver.
  As their (former Oak Park) Seagrave Aerial Ladder was a low profile apparatus I would have thought that they would have at least seen to it that the new rig would have matched the Seagrave at far as height clearances went. There are low profile rigs that are on the market and there are manufacturers that would be willing to work with the fire department to get an acceptable rig that would be able to meet the viaduct clearances.
  During the 1990’s when Chicago had initially purchased the Seagrave Patriot Aerial Ladders (the ones that were recently retired to become spare rigs) , it was found that some of them couldn’t clear some older fire stations. An example that I know of was that the plans were originally to assign one such rig to Truck 47 however it wouldn’t quite fit so it was given to Truck 56 instead. When the CFD ordered the new Pierce Trucks in 2000 they had worked with Pierce when they were issuing the specs so that they could be sure that the New Pierces were built low enough to clear some of the older stations and one of the first two did go to Truck 47.
  How does River Forest run their Truck in the first place (in terms of manning it)? To my understanding their are only 5 firefighters and one lieutenant on on duty (assuming that the numbers are still accurate). If 2 men are on the ambulance that leaves you with 3 men for the Engine company and I don’t know if the Lieutenant ride on a SUV as a shift commander or if he rides on the Engine. So is the Truck a Jump company or do they just run with 2 men on the Engine and 2 men on the Truck?
  Wasn’t the Oak Park Truck suppose to be running into River Forest on automatic aide or was that stopped?
  So an even more significant question besides the size and the dimensions of the River Forest or a future River Forest Truck is can River Forest really afford to run the Truck/Quint or do they really need it as it looks to me that they would have to take another company out of service in order to have enough men on board to actually man it as as company?
  It just may make more sense to combine the Oak Park ,River Forest and Forest Park fire departments into one larger fire department or fire protection district.

• #18 by Tom on December 2, 2013 - 2:27 PM

  

  It looks like the street was recently paved within the last few years. Not only does the clearance matter under the bridge, the road paving crew has to take in consideration of vehicle length approaching the viaduct and leaving the viaduct.

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