AndyC3J

Saturday August 4. Moved out of June 'cause there are usually too many other things going on.

The last Mack CF completely built by Mack was Westbury, NY (Long Island). It was replaced a few years ago with a KME, and is now privately owned by a collector in Pennsylvania. Somebody mentioned winning the lottery and buying a Mack to restore or preserve. I am one such win away from telling Golden's Bridge (among a few other select towns) to name their price!

Thanks for the update, Jim. Hope everything works out well all around.

Got a date confirmed yet? It's a sharp looking rig.....would love to see it and hopefully get some pics of it for my collection.

That's what it says on the Jimmy Foundation's website. I don't know when that info was posted, but that's what it says. It's only two months away. One would think that the info would be common knowledge by now, but that's just my $.02. Hopefully Jim and Gina are OK, and one or the other can post here soon and let everyone know what's up.

Yeah, I don't think something that big would fit in Edgewater Park.....LOL!!! Nice rigs. Hope they go to Photo Night so the rest of us can get some shots of them.

There is one pic posted on the WatchDesk forums, but they've been having server issues recently. May or may not be immediately accessible. The article in the print version of the paper shows a screen shot of the photog's website, with thumbnail images visible. From the looks of them, it seems as though somebody wanted their own version of the "Firehouse Dolls". Only I don't think these ladies are firefighters. Aside from that....nobody got hurt, no responses were delayed or blocked, no taxpayer money was spent. Maybe some rules were bent/broken or some conduct code violated, but it doesn't seem like the kind of thing that warrants a nearly full page 3 article thinly veiled as an attempt to call attention to the paid chief and other related issues.

Is there a way to tell the difference, other than the lack of the little Gladiator emblem on the bottom of the doors? Metro Star used to be the style of the old Gladiator (pre-2003) cab, but now they're apparently all the same. Still nice looking rigs.

Just curious.....any plans or intentions for a wetdown, or anything of the sort?

That's why the other idea got scrapped. The department number, followed by "Engine 1", "Engine 2", "Rescue 1", etc. Too many Engine 1s on scene at once, and just a matter of time before a department number isn't transmitted clearly and causes all manner of confusion.

Pierce = 2007, if not mistaken.

Yes, that is a Rescue 1 logo on the bumper (however, it's not on their New Deliveries page yet). The two green rigs are Spartan/Smeal. Click the image, it blows up to a hi-res photo, and you can see the Smeal logo on the grille, and the side of the pump panel.

Believe it may have been abandoned, but don't hold me to it. It did suffer flood damage from the back to back storms in September.

Not sure about the rehab, I assume there's something going on in that respect. Heard the same water main break rumors back when it was still daylight. Unknown if it was ever confirmed. There's a body of water (Moodna Creek?) running near the scene. They could likely draft that if need be.....if they're not already doing so.

He's all of 15 years old, too. Very impressive!

Still rotating different departments in for relief crews as of this writing. I believe there are only three battalions in the county that have not been involved in some way.....yet.

From what I've heard from various sources, at least part of the reason for the proposed renumbering is that a few battalions are said to be on the verge of running out of numbers. Ironically enough, two of them are the ones that have voted against the proposed plan. Perhaps restructuring the battalion lineage, or simply not assigning a number to every vehicle in the department (especially those not used frequently) might be an idea. Or, maybe just alter the amount of numbers available for each. Seems like there should be enough to go around, but that's just my two cents' worth. As for the cost of renumbering the rigs....a few recent deliveries (Chester, Circleville, Harriman, Johnson) came in numbered for the earlier proposed system, which was scrapped. At least one vehicle (Lakeside engine) has, to the best of my knowledge, never been numbered yet, as it was waiting to see what the new system ended up being. Will be interesting to see how it all plays out. Few years back, they tried the idea of referring to departments by number instead of name. That didn't last long, either.

There's also a reason why Engine 6 was kept as the spare, instead of 4's.......shorter wheelbase! There's one street in town that 6's old Pierce is the only rig that can get into that block on the first try. Thankfully they don't go there much.

The "target hazards" (high school, hospital, college, etc.) used to get 3 and 2. That's how much they've cut back already. Funny how Mayor DeStefano wants to make so many cuts to the paid force when only a few months ago, he was saying how Middletown should be first due to the new hospital (located in Mechanicstown's district) since the paid drivers can get there faster than Mechanicstown's vollies. During DeStefano's last reign as mayor, he wanted to cut the paid men altogether, make the department completely volunteer and have the police handle dispatching. He also at one point suspended the then-Chief for his actions of trying to encourage Middletown residents to dial MFD's seven digit phone line to report emergencies, rather than 911. There are two Middletown engines sitting in a certain nearby warehouse (old E4 and E6, replaced in 2009.....E6 had been used as a spare before the financial issues came about). Both would still make fine front line equipment for some less fortunate department somewhere. Sell them if they need the money so bad.

Rombout may be "better" (matter of opinion), but it is older. New Hamburg is the newer of the two rigs. Some nice shots of nice looking apparatus in this thread.

Heard it's for sale, with an asking price of $5,000.

I'm just glad nobody was hurt (and no rigs were damaged) from all those straight streams! And, it wasn't necessarily "taxpayer dollars"......certain manufacturers, KME included, have been known to foot the bill for such things as thanks for buying their product. Don't know if this was the case here or not, but there wasn't anything "over the top" extravagant going on.

They've had that for a little over a year. For some reason, Firematic just never added it to their New Deliveries page until recently.

With what Mr. Pinto listed, combined with all the other things that were either rumored or stated to have been in the works, it could have been a pretty ambitious year for them. Too bad it won't be happening. Yes, I agree......some of the production quantities were head scratchers. What happened to keeping them at 1500 to make the pieces more "collectible", and decrease the chances of having a lot of leftovers sit on the shelf for years. Oh well.....

Just read that myself a few minutes ago. Sad news, but can't say it surprises me.