Nelson Fire Rescue Service is rolling in style with the addition of a brand new pumper truck to its fleet.
The fire service has four fire apparatuses and two utility vehicles. The Fire Underwriters Survey requires municipalities Nelson’s size to replace each apparatus every 20 years dependent on maintenance records.
Nelson fire chief Jeff Hebert started designing the new truck about four years ago. He explained that new equipment is required to stay in line with the National Fire Protection Agencies standards.
“There’s a whole list of equipment and capacities that the fire truck needs to meet. They have to carry a certain amount of hose, a minimum amount of water, and a certain number of ladders, etc and then whatever additional we need for the municipalities.”
The new pumper will improve the fire service’s reliability, Hebert says It has an all-wheel drive system that wasn’t on the old truck which created challenges for the department.
“In Nelson our roads can be awful sometimes, and sometimes we have difficulty getting to the calls. So, this all-wheel drive system will allow us to get to the calls in a timelier fashion.”
Fire equipment in 2023 is not cheap, the price of a Fire truck ranges from about $600,000-$3 million depending on what type. Nelson’s new Pumper cost approx. $900,000.
However Nelson Fire Rescue allocates money in its annual budgets to an equipment replacement fund, meaning the new truck didn’t add a further financial burden on taxpayers. Hebert says it wasn’t cheap to replace but explains it’s an investment the city won’t have to make again for at least another 20 years.
“They’re not cheap but if you look at other equipment, dump trucks, loaders and even personal vehicles, they have a replacement period between 10 and 12 years. We’re getting almost double the life out of a fire truck because for one, they’re really well maintained and two, they’re built to a very high standard.”
