Bnechis

I don't believe NRPD ever had black & whites, prior to the current blue and whites they had a different shade of blue, with TPU units light blue over dark blue.

I am always impressed when a manufacturer tries to develop something new. While new ideas may or maynot be workable, when the engineers are allowed to try new concepts the fire service learns from it and moves forward. I see 3 major problems with the PUC. 1) The 360 degree view is only out at a distance. When standing at the pump panel you can not see 3 sides of the rig. Thats why the PUC in your pictures has a camera on the adjustable pole (to the right of the pump panel, on the back of the cab). The monitor is built into the MUC screen at the top left of the pump panel. In daylight it is not bright enough to see it and if you forgot to put the pole up, you have to climb back down, adjust it, then climb back up. 2) Climbing up to this "top mount" is a little shaky, climbing down is a career ender. It is very easy to take a header. If the pump operator can climb up at the begining of a fire and not come down again it might be ok, but I have never seen a pump operator that has the ability to stay at the pump panel 100% of the time. 3) The "S" turns in the pump intake reduce the pump capacity. I've heard that the best draft a 1500 gpm unit can do is 1,247 gpm (Miami-Dade).

My question is: does the amount of reflective material actually make it safer? When I've seen this reflective level at night on the highway, I find it so bright that its distracting and makes it hard to see where everything is. Consider what most DOT's do, thats Chevrons that one color is refective and the other painted only. that gives great contrast. I wonder if the 1901 comittee even considered this?

If you think the threat is real, then have the in-laws travel by subway. lol

They try to get some new cars every year. As they have for as long as I can remember.

LOL, Is that all he recieved?

Thats a good buy. The scrap price is running in that range

"Holt, who was recently suspended from the fire academy after a verbal dispute, was arrested in Mount Vernon in 1996 on charges of repairing a vehicle in the street. County court records received earlier by the newspaper show arrests for Holt in the late 1980s on charges including drug possession, weapon possession and harassment." Many communities have local codes prohibiting repairing a vehicle in the street. It prevents someone from "setting up" a repair "garage" on public streets or on private property that is not zoned for it. Chances are when the PD went to talk with him, he was unwilling to "accept" the ticket.

The cars have always been purchased in white and then they were painted blue. The new scheme requires no painting, new cars will go inservice sooner and it will save at least $10,000 per year. All new units will get this new scheme.

Very grown up statement, do you always judge people you do not know this way? No I actually am to busy making sure my department and my city is in a position to survive any disaster including this economic downturn. You referenced the great depression previously and how we made it through, but its clear you did not complete that history lesson. We were still in the depression on December 7th, What got us out of the depression was WWII. Many companies did very well then building the "arsenal of democracy", but many others failed, what did it cost us: 1) All americans were willing to sacrifice, mandatory rationing, no gas, 20,000,000 Victory Gardens planted, 6,500,000 women worked in defense industries and most important almost every family had members join the armed forces. 2) 416,800 US fatalities........670,846 wounded 3) US war cost $288,000,000,000 and consider that the average monthly wage was less than $100 What I found most obvious of what it cost was when walking through the American Cemetary in Normandy and seeing 9,387 Headstones and a wall of Missing with 1,557 names. 98% of those hero's were between 19 and 21 years old (they had enlisted about 2 years prior) and they all died within a 3 day window. Thats what got us out of the great depression. Yes they are "hurting, but they are not going under, and are not asking for handouts. The big 3 have been trying to go under since long before you were born. 1) they have not asked for any backing 2) I own 2 Honda's that were built in Ohio and 1 Ford that was built in Canada, Most people have no clue whats built where anymore. My family owned a Volvo in the Late 1970's. the Body was made in Belgium, the engine & tires in France, electrical in Germany, seats, Italy, AC & Transmission in the US and was assembled in Belgium. And they say its a Swedish Car........ Does this mean you think Nissan and Honda are different than Toyota? Why do you need to outrun them...dumb is not a crime Like I said, very grown up.

Glad you are so optimistic. 1) We dont know if the government will bail out the big 3. 2) Many "experts" have said if they are "bailed out", they will still go under, it will just take a few additional years and cost us billions. 3) Even if they pull thru, they may no longer be interested in the municipal market. Before you were born the most popular cop cars was the plymouth grand fury & the chevy impala. Everyond scrambled and went with the Ford when GM & Crysler stopped making those fleet cars (chevy came back a few years later). The municipal market is not as great as you think. Most municipal cars are purchased on state contract which averages 30% below sticker price. Its such a "great" market that the majority of vehicles are sold by 3 car dealers for the whole state of NY. We just purchased a new ford F350 pickup and the only dealer in NYS is Van Bortal Ford in Rochester. I believe that the dealer makes less than $100 per vehicle (but does get some form of a credit back from the manufacture). The US Auto industry made 15 million+ cars in 2007 (last yr of data) with 1.5 million exported. Info was from the US Commerce Dept. Interesting note CNN reports these are the totals for 2007: General Motors - 315,870 vehicles. Ford Motor - 195,245 vehicles DaimlerChrysler 156,314 vehicles Total 667,429 vehicles Big difference between 667,429 and 15,000,000+ CNN also noted that as of 8/1/2007 U.S. Big 3 Auto Sales dropped to 48.1% of the total market.

I think our PD has bigger bicycles. or they can cruse around on a Segway.

NFPA 1710 also feels its important, thats why it is required in this standard. We have moved away from the term "Aide" after a previous City Manager (with a history of cutting other FD's) wanted to know why DC's needed drivers (when he didn't have one?). We now utilize the term "ICT" or Incident Command Technician, which in addition to the duties listed by others here, is responsible for setting up and maintaining info on the command board.

How about this concept: What will be the work horse if/when the big 3 go down, Honda?

Good thing I have you to show me the way

MVFD has if, memory serves, has borrowed rig(s) from FDNY before. Yes, the NYSPFFA (NYS Professional Fire fighters association), which MV's union has elected not to participate with. Not likely that the FD in MV will ever get more public support as long as the citizens feel that sports are the #1 priority.

Yes and LTNRFD's name is mark and the clip art of the truck is in post #1 of this thread

Mark, your fire truck (Clip art) has amber lights...so it must be retired and not "respond" to calls. Good thing it didn't have blue......1,000 post later it still would be an issue lol

The only course you can take is FFI, the others are no longer offered (if you have them they count).

The only reason is because the NYS courses are run by OFPC and they are not very flexable in much of what they do.

Chris, ISO requires a ladder to cover 2.5 road miles out from its station. thats about 4.5 sq miles (the size of the city of MV) larger cities require more trucks. For up to 7 trucks in service they require 1 spare (so 1 truck or 7 requires 1 spare, 8 trucks requires 2). You get points for apparatus and for personnel. Without doing the math, its hard to say exactly what would happen, but I suspect they would drop about 1 PPC class, which would increase property insurance 8% for about 15 years (unless corrected). The ICMA will sell you the info, only if you are a member. ICMA's is not a "standard" but a text book: "Fire Service Managment" that is written for city managers to understand what FD's need. http://www.isomitigation.com is the link but there is almost no info on it about ISO's manpower criteria, just that you get points for every member on-duty and 0.3 points for on-call members who actually respond to each call (average). The maximum points you can get is 15+ (thats out of a total rating of 100. The reason for the plus, is they will give you greater points, if you can show they can be utilized and do not exceed the number that a rig can support, i.e. if you claim that 20 ff's respond with a single engine, they will only count about 6-8). Its very involved....lol (but it comes with big $$$)

NYS has run under the legal principal of "home rule" since the late 1700's. That means each local government gets to do what it believes is in its best interest (even if is not), and the county and the state have no say in it. Fire Coordinators ("battalions") are legally charged with "coordinating" mutual aid and do not have the legal authority to do anything beyond what the home rule agency wants, unless the local community is willing to sign away its legal rights and responsabilities (and most wont).

So NFPA 1710 and the ICMA (International City/County Managers) standards that say if you have high risk or high life hazards and calls for 4ff/1O on engines and 5ff/1o on trucks must be wrong. Also ISO credits the additional firefighters. ICMA considers 4/1 to be 100% effective and 3/1 to be undermanned. high risk includes factories, scgools, hospitals, nursing homes, high rise, etc.

While failing a ladder test generally does not prevent the vehicle from being driven (and used as a city service unit), its a very dangerous policy to do it. When you pull up to a fire with a mom holding her baby out the 5th floor window, what are you going to do? Even if it failed you'll put the stick up and run up it, great, you grap the kid then the ladder collapses. or you dont put it up and the community is up in arms because you did not make the rescue. If its O.O.S. keep it at the shop.

I'm not so sure that that is the primary reason. FDNY became career to stop the street fighting between companies. My dept started hiring people to maintain the stations and hourses over 110 years ago, we went 100% paid in 1927 when there were still 100's of active members and the dept was handling almost 200 calls per year. The reason we switched to a career dept was the chamber of commerce determined that the improved service would cost less, because of the drop in insurance costs. Most of the combo depts started because the FD wanted career personnel to maintain and drive apparatus. The call volume has little to do with the drop off, because that occured long before the big volume increase came. Many other factors account for the drop off.