M' Ave

If you exclude wild rigs like Bronto Skylifts and such, I believe that Sutphen is the only other make of a true TOWER LADDER. I'd bet that the spec all but excludes anyone else simply based on the fact that Seagrave owns Aerialscope and that's all the city really wants. Truth be told, while the Aerialscope platform is fantastic, I'm sure that many who work in companys with a a TL and in the shops would rather see another rig under that boom. The 2006ish order of 75' TLs and 95' TLs was terrible. A lot of those rigs have spent more time O.O.S. than in. Many gremlins effected their operation.

They WILL in fact need to use the 3rd rail. The frequency that power is delivered at (hertz) is not compatible with the M8, south of New Rochelle. The M8 car weighs 133,000lbs, thats each individual car. So, we're talking about a 10 car train that weighs almost 1.5 million pounds. This is overweight, but it would have been further over weight had the additional transformers for the Hell Gate catanary frequency not been removed from the plans.

You disagree, but you explain no portion of your position. WHY do you disagree? Do you have some facts to contest mine? The M-8 is being built in Nebraska, only the first few sets where built in Japan. As for the fare increases, well, no one likes them. However, your fare still covers only about 40% of operational costs. Every gov't and quasi gov't agency could use a little waste control, no question about it. However, the MTA is far from a corrupt organization. I also have to agree with the feelings about capitol plans. How about that direct connection to West of Hudson Service?! There are a great deal of projects that I'd like to see completed before East Side Access. For more info, visit www.Railroad.net It's an excellent source.

Amtrak owns and operates the line East of New Haven and also the Hell Gate line from New Rochelle through the Sunnyside Yards. They use different voltages and the M-8 can't handle all of them. Metro-North operates, I'm told, at 12.5 kv 60hz. Amtrak, from New Rochelle South, operates at 12.5 kv 25hz. East of New Haven has been upgraded to allow the M-8 to operate normally, although a run to Boston is about as likely as the Mets winning the World Series this year. As for Hell Gate, the 3rd rail would have to be extended across the bridge from the LIRR lines into Penn and almost all the way to New Rochelle. This presents another challenge, however, as the LIRR uses an over-running 3rd rail and MNRR uses and under running 3rd rail. There is, supposedly, a 3rd rail shoe for the M8 that will adjust position to run on either system. **Sourced from MNRR employee. I'm just a buff!

Are you certain? I'm not, but I thought that the total number of M-7s exceeded the number of M-1s retired. The retired 0 M-3s?

The answer is, never. They'll never run in regular Harlem or Hudson line service. The only time they'll operate on the Hudson line will be for Yankee Clipper trains from 153rd St., when traveling to the Highbridge Yard, to Kawasaki for warranty work or RARELY to the Harmon shops in Croton on Hudson. The vast majority of maintenance will be performed at the yards in New Haven, Ct. In the future these cars might see service East of New Haven, on the Shoreline East. They are capable, in practice, of running over the Hell Gate Bridge into Penn, but this is not slated for any time in the near future. The Harlem and Hudson lines have the M-7. The M-8 was paid for, in large part, but Connecticut and they want their trains running in their state. The M-8 is very unique in it's ability to operate on two types of electrical collection methods and utilize multiple voltages, including switching from A/C to D/C power. Their dual-mode abilities make them CONSIDERABLY more expensive than the single mode M-7. There is no shortage of equipment on the two NY lines and there is a serious shortage on the New Haven Line. The capabilities of the M-8 serve no purpose on the Harlem and Hudson, there for you will not see them in revenue service on those lines.

Metro-North has done a text book job of bringing the M-8 online. They spent a great deal of time planning and researching a new design. Once the first sets arrived, they began an aggressive daily testing routine. As per the contract, they cars had to withstand 4,000 problem free miles before acceptance. When there is any failure of any kind, the clock resets to zero. There are always issues in the beginning that need to be ironed out. Those first cars were running all hours of the night to rack up the miles and put them through their paces. Corrections have been made and now they have been accepted. They have entered revenue service as fast as MNRR could have possibly gotten them there. The only person to blame is the previous governor of Connecticut. His short sighted administration delayed funding repeatedly. Ct. is responsible for 70% of the New Haven lines costs, including fleet purchase costs. The M-8 design was finalized almost 5 years ago and funding was the only delay. Metro-North can't pay for them without gov't funding. Metro-North can't put them inservice without the appropriate testing Metro-North can't make Kawasaki build them faster, nor can it make the ships, trucks and trains get them here any faster. You'll note that when NY was solely responsible for the replacement of the M-1 and M-3 with the M-7, we didn't wait this long. Your anger is completely misplaced. There is only one group responsible for the delay and that is the Conn. Dept. of Transportation operating under the previous Governor's administration. Thankfully Gov. Rell took office and saw funding delivered. As for MNRR being a corrupt organization...well, no one doubts an interstate agency's high level of bureaucracy, but you should travel back in time 25 years and see what the railroad looked like then. MNRR under MTA has transformed a hodge-podge of railroads and equipment, with dilapidated infrastructure and rolling stock into one of the smoothest running commuter operations in the United States. Your comment certainly negates your knowledge of any "back-story".

Believe it or not, all our rigs come with those. Often times, especially with later arriving units like Rescue, the rigs are left farther from the scene without anyone around to keep an eye out. I think Rescue does lock at least some of their cabinets. Someone from one of the 5 would have to answer that though.

Yes, the lights are blue and they make the rig able to carry more equipment and help the firemen on-board to be better at their jobs.

That's what you're going with? "Classy", gotcha!

Nope! Not for show....well, actually they are, but not for that show. The 5 Rescues have the cast aluminum wheels, but all other rigs recently delivered and on order have red painted steel wheels. Those S.O.C. guys get all the toys! You point out some good attributes of aluminum wheels. Heat dissipation should never be much of an issue in NYC. If it is, you're just going too fast! DSNY, MTA Bus and FDNY all use steel wheels. There are some exceptions, but thats what they are, exceptions. Steal does dominate our collective fleet. I'm sure those rims are very cheap to replace and they do get replaced a lot. They get bent hitting curbs and potholes all the time. While alumimun won't bend the way the steel wheels will, they do crack and chip. All in all, over a 10 year front line lifespan, the cost probably isn't worth it. They do look nice, but I'm partial to the painted steel. It's meaner. No, but you sure can crack it.

It's a top from a boat. They call it a Bimini. Lame

You are completely incorrect. I don't know of any career jobs that DO NOT do a full background and psych exam. The rest of your statement highlights the trouble that has come into the discussion here. You said, "their standards". We need standards, not individual department bench marks. Standards, period. OSHA standard physicals should be an annual requierment. I went through them as a volunteer and I wasn't in the only department that did them. It's doable and it should be implemented across the board. Background checks as well, although I think a lot of agencies already do this. There is some very real truth to this. Many of the volunteers that I served with raced to sign up for every class that popped up. They couldn't get enough! However, to say "most" is really not the case. I would say that most stop at the minimum. The minimum standard needs to be raised. It needs to be raised or everyone safety. Your own and that of those we work around daily. That bar needs to be set higher and the quality and quantity of training classes needs to be improved. I realize this is all very complicated, with budgets coming under fire, but training needs to be a municipal priority.

This is a mis-used term. There are no Battalion Chief positions. There are Battalion Coordinators. They do not have a role in incident command, they serve to coordinate mutual aid as it responds and arrives. It's an important positions with so many departments working together who might not be familiar with each other, but it's a coordinator, not a chief.

This topic has strayed VERY far, however the debate has been interesting, if not all-together original. As for indemnification; I certainly support the notion that volunteers should be protected. I also agree that serving your community as a volunteer fireman is not the same as doing work with the local soup kitchen. That said, to what extent are we looking to grant indemnity? If we examine driving and all the responsibility it entails, you'll find one of the most stressful positions a fireman can be assigned. I'll tell you this right now, the regulations regarding an engine or ladder co. chauffeur are extremely vague. The regs. are filled with terms like, "due regard" and such. This leaves the city JUST enough rope to hang you with. If a guy is in a major accident, HE is most certainly on the hook and can be found at fault. What happens to a chauffeur if he gets in an accident? That goes on HIS personal driving record. What does he get in return? Well, he gets chauffeur pay.....which isn't much more than $1,000 dollars a year. That isn't even enough to pay your car insurance. A company is assigned 4 "Seated chauffeurs". They are scheduled in such a way that they do most of the driving. In a single year, they'll probably combine to drive that rig 8,000-10,000. That's probably 10 years worth of miles on most volunteer rigs. This can all be dwarfed by the officers responsibility. One single person is responsible for 4 or 5 in his charge. If a company officer departs from standard operating procedures or fails to account for the actions of his men, do you think that he's not responsible? He is! A chief officer standing in the street has a great deal of information coming his way. He has a great deal of people working under his charge and they're all in harms way. If something happens with tragic results, you can bet that chief officer is going to be run through the wringer to determine if there was negligence on his part. We need to provide people with adequate protection for the work they do, however we do not need to protect people from negligence. Career and volunteer, we all strive to be "professional" and part of that stature is to be held to a high standard. If you fail to meet that standard you can be held liable. Just to stray momentarily off the topic again: I was a member of 3 volunteer organizations over the course of about 10 years. I'm grateful to have "honorary membership" status with one of those fine institutions, which I had to move away from. I believe that there is a need for volunteer firemen in many communities in some form or another, combo or otherwise. I know that some of these organizations are run very well and others are not. Some guys are very reliable, into the work and well trained and others are not. An unfortunate, but very clear fact is that training standards are not the same. I had taken upwards of 200 hours of county and state fire courses prior to going through the fire academy at The Rock. It. Is. Not. The. Same. Not one bit. This is not due to a lack of effort on the parts of those attending training classes, nor those teaching the classes, however, the resources they have come up short. There simply isn't enough manpower to run drills and exercises with the students at the same pace and intensity. Instructors simply cannot demand the same from volunteers that they can from subordinate employees. That, however, is not the be all and end all.

So, to paraphrase: We should make it easier for people with emergency response vehicles to abuse the privilege and take it to work, say way out of district. To be honest, I don't REALLY have a problem with the ghost lettering. Chief's in volunteer situations are given a vehicle, sometimes. It's a good resource for them, but not everyone wants to drive around a billboard, I understand that.

The street pull-box has not become obsolete. Not one bit. Unless you can show me a fool-proof, never fail method of reporting an emergency, there will be a place for the street pull box. Oh, remember that this device has to be available to everyone. How many people don't have cell-phones, or home phones? Not many in Dobbs Ferry, but in some inner-city neighborhoods, there are still some without. How about a child? That same group of kids who maliciously pulls the box after school might actually have an emergency to report and no phone. How about a catastrophic event? I don't know about you, but on 9/11 or the 2003 black-out, I couldn't make a phone call on my cell for hours. Dispatch has taken steps to reduce malicious false alarms. Almost all pull-type boxes have been replaced with an intercom style. The person pushes a button and speaks with a dispatcher. Between the hours of 7am and 11pm, if no contact is received by the dispatcher, no units respond. If a "no-contact" box is received after 11pm, one single engine responds to investigate. It doesn't happen often, but I have responded to more than one "ERS" (intercom pull-box) alarm that turned out to be an all hands fire. While the alarm was phoned in as well, it was the ERS report that had us out the door 30 seconds earlier. The street alarm box still has a functional place in many areas. Cost? It is an almost invisible line item on this city's budget. It is a small price to pay for a tried and true system. This is a great example of positive redundancy. Lastly, in light of the recently introduced "UCT 911" system and it's many shortcomings and failures, it's nice to know that there is still as system out there that will put the public in direct contact with Fire or Police dispatchers and not some low-rent, ineffectively trained call-taker.

From the looks of that video, they had heavy fire from the get go. I'm just guessing because the second stick was still going up. Tough deal when you're met with such advanced fire on arrival.

I don't know about the PBA, but the UFA did not support Bloomberg in his 3rd term bid. We supported.....what was his name again? Thompson, that's it! Thompson. He was an empty seat, sadly. It was vote for Bloomberg or vote for no one. I voted for Thompson, but it was in vain.

Lately it's nice for us to get a little positive press...even if it's a tragedy for someone else. Shows good work.....and stops the propaganda pension related stories for 24hrs!

Good, fast work by those medics, taking a dash in. Heads up move alerting the residents to get out. Good work by 42 Truck, good shop. Yes by the way....that Lt's name is actually Robert E. Lee!! Worked with him a couple of times, knows his stuff.

At one time I thought Mayor Bloomberg would be good for New York. Then, shortly after, he started to make me nervous. Now I'm sure he's a lying politician scumbag of the worst kind. This assault on the VSF (Variable Supplement Fund) is a pack of lies and propaganda. Calling it a Christmas Bonus is just a way to get hard-up civilians to rally against us. The VSF is nothing of the sort. It is a dividend, a dividend for money the unions gave the city. The city of New York was broke. The unions gave the city hundreds of millions of dollars and allowed them to manage it and use it as they deemed necessary. Payments to members of the unions was differed until that member retired, like a bond in a way. When you buy a bond, you give the gov't money and they have 14 years to make use of it, but then they owe you your money back plus 14 years of compounded interest which doubles the amount they owe you. The VSF is OUR MONEY BACK WITH INTEREST! At some point the city made a deal to keep the amount at a set figure, not market variable. That deal left us receiving $12,000 annually upon a non-disability retirement. Believe me, if the city agreed to pay $12,000, it was because they were doing much better than that! They made untold gains on the original seed money we gave them decades ago, some say billions. Now the market hasn't kept them on top. Now WE'RE the ones making out on this deal they orchestrated and they want to take it away. When you walk into a Casino, sit at a Blackjack table and place a bet. When you lose, just take your money back! Why not? You can do that right? This is exactly how Mayor Bloomberg is playing the game. The city made a deal and right now it isn't working in their favor, but for years and years it was.

We use nylon laid rope, i believe it's 15/16th' diameter. It's 200' feet long. Heavy duty clips are spliced into each end. That's all there is too it. That rope, coupled with the Gemtor harness everyone has, is all you need. A couple of good truckies can have this set-up with a member ready to be lowered in seconds. It's quick and simple, but yes, needs to be gone over all of the time. Both the engine and the truck carry the rope, but the rope is not assigned to a position in the engine as it is in the truck. It will serve as a back-up when the truck is repacking their rope. Trucks repack the rope every Monday. Typically we'll take the rope out, dump it and run through the evolution a couple of times. (The pole hole serves this activity well!) Then the the rope is inspected as it's repacked, changing which end starts the pack. This all helps eliminate the rope's "memory". We'll go through this same deal with the engine's rope every Tuesday. The key to the fireground rope rescue is knowing the knots and the procedure COLD. There's really only one knot involved in the deployment, and in some cases none. HOWEVER, it's a long rope and you need to makes sure that you have a handle on the correct portion. The lowerer needs to be properly anchored and the lowered member has to be make sure they are properly secured and that the member handling the lowering has done everything correctly. Their life will be in that members hands!

Soft ground? Realistically, if burning up is the alternative, I think you could hang from a sill and drop to the ground. If a F.D. had to effect a rescue, you could employ a roof rope rescue and then be lowered to the ground. The member to be lowered could be lowered from the roof using the tip of an aerial as an anchor point. The pitch of the roof might make this difficult and a rescue of this sort is ideally performed on a flat roof. Well...it's an odd situation. I'm thinking outside the box. As for a ground ladder finding solid ground; those pillars could easily be 40+ feet into the ground to find stable footing. The ground ladder might not be stable at all. Remember, a 35' extension ladder weights 135 lbs. Add the rescuer and the "rescuee" and you could be sinking fast. ...I still think that someone would he apt to hang and drop. From the looks of that photo, it looks like hanging would leave you about 10-12 feet up. Not too bad considering.

The only thing that will satisfy the Vulcan Society is handing the job to any potential Vulcan Member who walks through the door. Qualifications are simply an inconvenience.