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Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut





Denison, Iowa

Yeah, that's my town, that's our river, and that's the local lake. The camera angle and lense make that lake look MUCH larger than it really is. It's about a mile lone and farely narrow. I believe I breifly mentioned it earlier.

The river is a bit weird. As it is shown in the pictures it is slightly higher than normal. If the ground water level is high and we have some heavy rains the river could swell to 7 feet deep or so, but falls down within a couple days. During dry summer months it's not uncommon for it to trickle down to less than a foot deep and litterally so narrow you can jump across it.

Of course, back in 1993 it crested at 25 feet deep. Those were "fun" times.
   
Made in us
5th God of Chaos! (Yea'rly!)




The Great State of Texas

looks like all you need is a perot boat and some ropes.

-"Wait a minute.....who is that Frazz is talking to in the gallery? Hmmm something is going on here.....Oh.... it seems there is some dispute over video taping of some sort......Frazz is really upset now..........wait a minute......whats he go there.......is it? Can it be?....Frazz has just unleashed his hidden weiner dog from his mini bag, while quoting shakespeares "Let slip the dogs the war!!" GG
-"Don't mind Frazzled. He's just Dakka's crazy old dude locked in the attic. He's harmless. Mostly."
-TBone the Magnificent 1999-2014, Long Live the King!
 
   
Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut





Denison, Iowa

Oh, and as for the flow rate of this river, as long as it's below waist-deep, it's managable. The average "lazy river" water park attraction is far worse than this river.

In fact, one of the local kids' activities is to have a parent drive upstream to the next river access (about 2.5 miles) and drop you off in your swimming suit with an innertube. You and your friends then float downstream while the parents go shopping at Wal Mart. They'll pick you up in a little over an hour when you make it back to town. This is literally the same stretch of river the accident happened on.
   
Made in us
[DCM]
Secret Squirrel






Leerstetten, Germany

How big is the area the FD responds to, who do they mutual aid with? Do they have rivers/lakes? How far away is the closest department with swift water rescue equipment?
   
Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut





Denison, Iowa

oddly enough, almost every town within 50 miles of us has some kind of emergency response, even if it's just a single fire truck. A bit of a small town mentality, but by the time the "official" request for assistance is put out a nearby town's FD is usually all ready on the way.

After the severe flooding this area sustained back in 1993 the Federal Government gave our A LOT of money for flood control and swift water rescue training and equipement. Chances are that no matter where you are in western Iowa there is a town within 15 to 30 miles with some form of trained river rescue.
   
Made in us
[DCM]
Secret Squirrel






Leerstetten, Germany

If I post the question a third time, will there be an actual answer?

   
Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut





Denison, Iowa

Other than our city, our Fire department covers (overlapping with other large fire departements) aproximately a dozen other small towns. A few of these towns have populations between 250 and 500 people. I'd say that it's within a 20 mile radius.


That's a best guess anyway, at least until I can get off work, and make an official inquirey.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/02/21 15:52:27


 
   
Made in us
[DCM]
Secret Squirrel






Leerstetten, Germany

Thanks. I was just wondering if you knew what areas your department assists and what assistance you had available to your own town, and an "I'm not sure" is a good enough answer for me.

From your own answers it sounds like there are times where the river is dangerous enough to warrant swift-water rescue equipment, but most of the times it is a pretty calm body of water. So you just have to make the decision if you think that the risk is high enough and frequent enough to warrant additional equipment. A 7 foot deep fast moving river is extremely dangerous, a shallow slow moving river where kids can go tubing isn't. Sounds like your river is both, depending on the circumstances, so it could use the additional equipment.

Fire Departments have to take the "what is the likelihood something can happen" and "could we use this equipment" into consideration all the time. A small river is like a house that isn't on fire: pretty easy to manage. You don't need additional resources until the river crests or the house starts burning, and then you need it fast. Yes, swift-water rescue equipment is always useful to a department. I'm sure your department could also use a better Engine, a Quint, a better Brush Truck, a better radio system, etc.

All that equipment is useful and nice to have, but the question is "how often do we need it" and "how fast could we get it here if we need it". It sounds like your answer to the "how often would we need it" is "not often enough to justify it", and that's fine.

Having worked in fire, I'm used to expanding the "how often do WE need it" question into "how often would we USE it", by thinking about our mutual aid departments. We were a rural department and were surrounded by a lot of rural departments, so a lot of our purchases were made with these other departments in mind and how our equipment and teams can compliment each other to provide a comprehensive service to our communities by working together.

If you have a department that can respond quickly that that the equipment your department was asking for, then that is also something to take into consideration when making the decision about donating. If your department is already the best equipped water rescue department helping the neighboring departments and wants to expand that service, that is also something to take into consideration when making the decision about donating.

I'm not trying to say you are wrong for not wanting to donate, you live in this community and you know what's going on there. I'm just always curious about fire departments since I spend a good chunk of my life serving as a volunteer and doing administrative stuff for them so that's the reason I looked up what department it actually was, the area they serve, and what kind of calls they get. And the reason I asked about mutual aid and talked a little bit about swift-water rescue is because those were the kind of things we took into consideration when asking for equipment, which is also not something most lay-people thought about.

That's all.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/02/21 16:12:04


 
   
Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut





Denison, Iowa

D-usa,
Since you have worked emergency services before, may I ask you a realistic question? Another one of those "do we really need it" situations from about 10 years ago: Our town needed a new ladder truck for the fire department. Our old one definately showed its age. However, there were two models they were looking at. One had a 75 (perhaps 80?) feet of ladder, and the other had 125. The difference in price was about $50,000. They opted for the larger ladder. The issue is that our town only has one structure with four floors, and only a handful with three. Almost everything is one or two stories. Is there a situation you could think of that would require more than the 75 foot of ladder?

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/02/21 20:12:10


 
   
Made in us
5th God of Chaos! (Yea'rly!)




The Great State of Texas

Sounds like that would reach ten stories per this link, but that doesn't really take into account distance from the fire.

http://www.firehall.com/forum/showthread.php?t=14090

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/02/21 20:16:20


-"Wait a minute.....who is that Frazz is talking to in the gallery? Hmmm something is going on here.....Oh.... it seems there is some dispute over video taping of some sort......Frazz is really upset now..........wait a minute......whats he go there.......is it? Can it be?....Frazz has just unleashed his hidden weiner dog from his mini bag, while quoting shakespeares "Let slip the dogs the war!!" GG
-"Don't mind Frazzled. He's just Dakka's crazy old dude locked in the attic. He's harmless. Mostly."
-TBone the Magnificent 1999-2014, Long Live the King!
 
   
Made in us
[DCM]
Secret Squirrel






Leerstetten, Germany

 cuda1179 wrote:
D-usa,
Since you have worked emergency services before, may I ask you a realistic question? Another one of those "do we really need it" situations from about 10 years ago: Our town needed a new ladder truck for the fire department. Our old one definately showed its age. However, there were two models they were looking at. One had a 75 (perhaps 80?) feet of ladder, and the other had 125. The difference in price was about $50,000. They opted for the larger ladder. The issue is that our town only has one structure with four floors, and only a handful with three. Almost everything is one or two stories. Is there a situation you could think of that would require more than the 75 foot of ladder?


We didn't have any ladder trucks, or quints which are a nice compromise, so I'm not really familiar with their operations. I know that you are looking at a couple different factors with their use though:

For one, a 75 foot, or 125 foot, ladder isn't going to be 125 feet tall when it comes to operations. Every foot that the truck is away from the building results in a reduction in how tall the ladder can reach (a^{2}+b^{2}=c^{2},). How far the ladder can park to the building depends on access to the building and the amount of fire present if heat is keeping the vehicle away. Another factor is the purpose of the operation. A roof rescue, or roof operations, need to be able to reach the roof of a building. If you are suppressing the fire you want the nozzle above the roof of the building to be able to aim down into the ventilation cut (or collapsed roof). So you might want something a little taller than the tallest building.

There are also some requirements for fire department ratings or insurance ratings for cities that require certain sizes, but I have no idea what they are.

A purely practical issue during purchasing might be that buying a ladder truck, regardless of size, is already a pretty big expense to begin with. If they are buying new and are having a truck build to spec it might not be much more expensive to go for a taller ladder since you already sunk a huge part of the cost into the vehicle itself. It also depends on what kind of ladder truck you are buying. There are ladder trucks with buckets/platforms, ladder trucks without a bucket, quints with smaller ladders (or no ladders). So a taller ladder without a bucket might be the same price as a shorter one with a bucket with everything else being equal.

If they were buying used they might have had additional factors come into play aside from just the length: Was it a ladder truck of a quint (terminology varies somewhat, but one does not have any water or a pump, and the other stores water and can pump from a hydrant as well). If both were quints then did they have different tank sizes, different pump ratings, how much personnel could each carry, how old was each, etc. The more expensive truck might have had a longer ladder, but maybe it also had additional factors that played into the decision.

We never purchased a ladder truck, but our new engine we purchased and had build to our specs cost us $500,000 and ladder trucks are usually more expensive. If you are already dropping half a million on a vehicle, an extra $50,000 isn't that much, especially if you need a certain size for insurance purposes.

Of course, fire department apparatus are also partially a dick measuring contest and departments will want to have a bigger one than the neighbors.

So plenty of factors can come into play. They might have had a legitimate need for the taller size, it might have been economical factor considering the total price of the apparatus and the total package being delivered, or the chief might have been compensating for something.


   
Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut





Denison, Iowa

Yeah, it was a pumper truck.

Thanks for filling me in on things. Some of them I pretty much figured out on my own, but it's nice to have confirmation.
   
 
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