Posts Tagged Hurricane

Chicago new apparatus assignments – update

Jan 20

Posted by bgshap in Fire Department News, Fire Service News, New Delivery | 11 Comments

The fifth new Spartan/Crimson 103′ rear mount aerial in Chicago will be assigned to Truck 59. That makes Truck Companies 9, 31, 51, 56, & 59 the recipients of the five aerials that have been delivered to date. Each of these companies currently runs with a 1996 Seagrave except Truck 51, which has a 1995 Seagrave, the oldest ladder in front line service in Chicago. After these new rigs go into service, there will be two remaining 1996 Seagrave trucks that are assigned to Trucks 61 and 62.

As a side note, there are three 1996 HME 1871/Simon-LTI 100′ tower ladders currently assigned to Tower 21, Tower 37, and Tower 39. Due to an accident with their 2002 Pierce Dash Tower Ladder, Tower 34 is running again with their 1988 E-ONE Hurricane 95′ tower ladder.

Chicago Fire Department Truck 59 1996 Seagrave

Chicago Truck 59 and Truck 31 at the Quinn Fire Academy yesterday. All three shifts of the five companies receiving the new Spartan/Crimson aerials are rotating through the academy to receive training on the new apparatus before getting the rigs. Steve Redick photo

Chicago Fire Department Truck 31 2010 Spartan Crimson

The rear of Truck 31 shows that all ground ladder storage is within the center of the truck. A first for Chicago is full compartmentation on both sides of the rigs. Steve Redick photo

Tags: Chicago Fire Department, Chicago Towe 39, Chicago Tower 21, Chicago Tower 34, Chicago Tower 37, Chicago Truck 31, Chicago Truck 51, Chicago Truck 56, Chicago Truck 59. Chicago Truck 9, Crimson, Dash, E-ONE, Gladiator, HME 1871, Hurricane, Pierce, Simon-LTI, Spartan, Steve Redick, tower ladder

Chicago apparatus on-scene

Nov 5

Posted by bgshap in Apparatus on-scene, Fire Department News, Reader submission | Comments off

Oak Park firefighter Dan McInerney submitted several recent images of CFD apparatus at two different incidents.

The first images show T29 and E113 at a still alarm at 5148 W. Madison on 11/4/10. The fire was in the grease chute of a one story 75×35 restaurant. One line off E113 was used.

Firefighters guide Truck 29's main to the roof at 5148 W. Madison Street yesterday. Dan McInerney photo

One line was used off of Engine 113 for a grease fire at this restaurant yesterday. Dan McInerney photo

Truck 29 operates with a 2002 Pierce Dash 100' rear mount aerial with shop #E303. Dan McInerney photo

The medium duty Pierce aerials which are in Chicago's fleet require only one set of outriggers. The tip load is rated at 500 pounds. Aerials with heavier tip load capacities require additional jacks. Dan McInerney photo

The next images are of CFD T28 at a still at 2015 N. Elston. Fire was in a rooftop ventilation unit of a large factory complex. Two lines off E30 were used.

CFD Truck 28 is deployed to the roof of an industrial building at 2015 N. Elston Avenue. An interesting note about the CFD E-ONE aerials for historians or those interested in trivia is that for each of the nine units made in 2000, the three-digit shop id# (E287 for Truck 28) is the same as the last three digits of the E-ONE shop order number (so121287 for Truck 28). Dan McInerney photo

Chicago Truck 28 runs with one of nine E-ONE Hurricane 100' rear mount aerials that were delivered in 2000. Unlike the Pierce units, these operate with two sets of jacks. These rigs and ladders are made of aluminum. Dan McInerney photo

Tags: aluminum, Chicago, Dan McInerney, Dash, E-ONE, Hurricane, medium duty ladder, Pierce, rear mount aerial

Gurnee is on the site

Nov 3

Posted by bgshap in Fire Department News, New Listing, Patch | Comments off

Fire departments in Lake County, MABAS Division 4, continue to be added to the site. The Gurnee Fire Department is now the latest to be posted. They have two stations covering 33 square miles which includes the Six Flags Great America amusement park and Gurnee Mills, an enormous outlet mall. The Gurnee suppression fleet is made up entirely of E-ONE apparatus and currently all four of their ambulances are Type I models from Road Rescue on IHC 4700 or IHC 4300 series’ chassis. A new Type I ambulance is presently on order from Wheeled Coach.

Gurnee also houses some specialty MABAS assets. They store an interesting 1991 Mack/Volvo roll-off chassis which is used to transport metal storage containers which contain equipment and supplies for MABAS Divisions 4&5. One container is for the Technical Rescue Team (TRT) with tools and lumber and the other is for the Wildland Task Force which carries, among other things, an ATV.

Gurnee Fire Department headquarters Station 1 on Old Grand Avenue. Larry Shapiro photo

An interesting note about the E-ONE apparatus is the wide range of chassis and cab styles that are represented.

Gurnee Fire Department E-ONE Cyclone II engine

This engine features the newest version of the Cyclone II which is a tilt-cab.

Gurnee Fire Department EONE Cyclone engine

This 1995 engine uses the early Cyclone chassis with a fixed cab.

Gurnee also has two engines with a Cyclone tilt-cab with a previous grille design. The tower ladder is built on a Hurricane chassis which has a fixed cab.

Gurnee Fire Department E-ONE Hurricane 95' tower ladder

In 1998 when Gurnee received their new E-ONE tower ladder, they arranged to have the unit photographed with one of the main town attractions. At that time, Gurnee Mills was billed as the largest outlet mall in the country. Planet Hollywood was one of the anchor restaurants at the mall. Larry Shapiro collection

Gurnee Squad 1352 was ordered with a four-door Sentry cab and a vista roof. The Sentry is distinguishable by the straight, non-contoured door line of the driver's door. The vista roof was a raised roof that E-ONE offered without full height rear doors. This photo was taken inside Six Flags Great America when the squad was delivered. The graphics are no longer representative of how the squad looks today. Larry Shapiro collection

Tags: Cyclone, Cyclone II, E-ONE, fixed cab, Gurnee, Gurnee Mills, Hurricane, IHC, Lake County, MABAS Division 4, patch, Road Rescue, Sentry, Shapiro, Six Flags Great America, tilt-cab, tower ladder

Richmond FPD is posted

Jul 16

Posted by bgshap in Fire Department News, New Listing, Site News | Comments off

Along the Illinois/Wisconsin border in McHenry County is the town of Richmond and the Richmond Fire Protection District. They are in Division 5 covering roughly 28 square miles from one fire station which is packed with apparatus. The design of the Richmond fire station is sightly unique in that all of the apparatus bays are in the rear of the ‘L-shaped’ building.

Richmond Fire Protection District Fire Station

The Richmond FPD station was designed in an 'L-shape' with the apparatus bays around the back of the building. Larry Shapiro photo

The department has a full-time chief and is staffed by 40 part-time firefighters. They run two engines, a truck, a tanker, two ambulances, a brush unit, two AWD ATVs and a pickup which doubles as a chase vehicle for medical runs and a take-home vehicle for the night-time shift commanders. Additionally, they have two beautiful antique engines.

Several years ago, Richmond purchased a 1984 E-ONE, 110′, rear mount, single axle straight truck from Franklin Park. This was an early custom cab/chassis unit from E-ONE with the square cab. Richmond updated the emergency lighting, repainted the black roof white and did various other work to the unit before putting it in service.

Richmond FPD EONE E-ONE 110' truck X-Franklin Park

One of Richmond’s engines built in 1999 by US Tank with an enclosed top-mount pump panel has a twin unit in neighboring Spring Grove. Both feature the HME 1871 super command cab.

Tags: antique, Division 5, EONE, Franklin Park, HME, Hurricane, Mchenry County, patch, Pirsch, Richmond, Shapiro, Spring Grove, Stratosphear, US Tank, US Tanker

Des Plaines updates

Jun 10

Posted by bgshap in Fire Department News, New Delivery, updated listing | Comments off

In December, Des Plaines received their third Pierce engine. Going into service at station 3, Engine 63 replaced a 1995 E-ONE Hurricane 1500/750 top-mount. The new engine is the

Des Plaines Fire Department Engine 63 Pierce Arrow XT

first Arrow XT in Des Plaines as Engine 61, Engine 62 and Truck 81 are all on Dash chassis. The E-ONE is now designated Engine 64R and the 1993 Spartan/Darley that was previously lettered as Engine 64R has now become Engine 65R. This unit will be stored at the public works facility and will primarily act as a reserve piece for the truck companies. Most of the hose has been removed and it will carry as much of the truck tools as it can. For the detail people who follow apparatus, it is interesting to note that the rig has a 1500-GPM pump but is listed on the Pierce website as having a 2000-GPM pump.

Squad 55, the 6×6 military surplus TRT unit is sporting a new canvas cover for the bed. The OD-green cover has been replaced with one with a camouflage design.