Has nobody got an answer yet as to why early firefighters grew, and stuffed beards into their mouths? I’d have thought it was a fire hazard and in any case their nostrils were still exposed to the smoke …jimstravaiger
Jim, It seems the answer would be just as it says, a vain attempt to filter the fumes, which in those early days they probably believed would work but as we know today it would be useless. The idea then would be to fight the fire from outside the building, squirting water through windows and doorways, containing the fire rather than fighting it as crews are taught today, just a few seconds in a smoke filled room is enough to drive you towards fresh air and add the heat as well and the body instictively makes a break for cooler and cleaner air. Even Firemen in those days wouldn’t have been able to stay in acrid smoke for long.
Many of the people that would jump from the Twin Towers rather than tolerate the heat and smoke would have been driven by this primitive escape measure, just as an animal does, no matter what the brain might be telling you the body just wants to get away and jumping out into the open despite being Hundreds of feet up would have seemed the better choice. Fire has a strange effect, it can mesmerise and terrify but tremendous heat only causes instant retreat without having to be told. Can’t believe in this day and age we allow people to play around with fire as they do on November 5th! Just to get back to the original point Jim I have pics of Firemen of old with only whispy taches so not all of them grew huge beards, this might just have been a fashion of the times rather than a safety measure all Firemen tried to follow. Cheers Franky.
A good answer, well presented Frank thanks
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The You Tube footage is scary eh? So easily done when you’ve both got your sirens on… we had several incidents with two fire engines colliding, one was two platforms colliding on a 90 degree built up corner, going opposite directions and then a couple of engines running up the back end of each other = ladders through the windscreen! Believe it or not the majority of collisions were in the station yards or when travelling 30mph or below!
Included a couple of old pictures from Hull when it was the old City Brigade and one from Grimsby showing the line up at Peaks Lane fire station in the days of the Grimsby Fire Brigade - enjoy.
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I was heavily involved with the CARP project and when I’ve got time, I’ll write the story down…regarding your question who pays? well, we all do, public sector and all that, sad but true mate! Thanks for keeping the thread going though…ya can’t whack a bit of healthy debate…
The CARP story made for interesting reading, being a Vehicle Technician for Tyne and Wear Fire Service, we, like many other Brigades heard about the new Carp’s although non were ever sent our way for a look see although there was talk of our illustrious leaders being interested in the concept until rumblings of there abilities came to light and the decision was made to stick to Volvo appliances in a similar layout as used in the past. The newspaper article mentioned will make for interesting debate on Monday morning amongst the ‘lads’, however after reading many of the replies to the forum which ran the article it seems most Fire Services in the country suffer from the same problem, they have people specifying, ordering, buying and being involved with procuring new vehicles that have little knowledge of what they are doing or any experience of the Road Haulage Industry and its many rules, regulations and laws and even less knowledge on the technical side of vehicles.
Many, many mistakes are made and the good old taxpayer foots the bill. A lot of these people wouldn’t last five minutes in haulage or the ‘real world’ as we often say, some of them are uniformed officers and some corporate staff. We might forgive the uniformed guys for dropping goolies as they are basically Firefighters that have moved up the ladder (no pun intended) but the civilian managers have no excuse for poor judgments regarding fleet vehicles as they are supposed to have past experience in the industry. Sadly I doubt if the latest streamlining to the Public Sector in recent reviews will resolve this type of situation either, it seems its easier to blame the vehicle manufacturers or outside bodies than anyone in the Service. Franky.
Good points there Frank. I worked on our regional CARP project from its inception, the idea came ‘from above’ higher than Chief Fire Officers and the main idea was to save jobs. Most stations that had aerial trucks also had pumps too and by integrating the two vehicles could return potential job savings of 10 or more posts on a wholetime station.
We were ‘instructed’ to research CARP as a region but North Yorks were not interested as they had just purchased a couple of aerial trucks and West Yorkshire saw no mileage in the examples that were favoured. We went to look at the truck that was being built for Strathclyde as they had placed an order to 20 in total. Sadly they were being built by Saxon who went into administration when the first one was nearing completion. I think it was finished off by John Dennis Coachbuilders who took on the VEMA platform contract. We also went to Angloco at Batley as they were building some for Scotland and Ireland.
As you rightly say Franky there were some disasterous mistakes made many of which were driven by those in high places not understanding that there wasn’t enough room or weight capacity to fit all of this equipment but we were pushed to make them work. The Humberside / Sth Yorkshire examples were built on Mercedes Econic chassis with a Hilton boom package. These were the first Hilton fire/rescue platforms in the UK but they are commonplace in their home country Holland, Hilton engineering are nothing short of excellent in my opinion. Our contract was with TVAC who also went into administration whilst the vehicles were being built.
Clearly there’s much more to the story but I don’t want to bore you all with it except that the BBC picked up the thread and made a documentry based on the CARP not being in service and brigades cancelling orders. I feel that whilst not fit for purpose, the Humberside CARP is an excellent aerial truck and really looks the part. It performs well and turns on a ‘tanner’ with the rear steer axle.
I’ll post some pics soon
Steve
I spent many a wet cold happy hour on that tilt bed mate…is that a Greater Manchester vehicle?
Glenn R:
I spent many a wet cold happy hour on that tilt bed mate…is that a Greater Manchester vehicle?
I think it may well of been - Any idea where it was built ■■ - I’m sure after we fitted the new engine to it and it was tilt tested i had to deliver it somewhere but can’t remember whereabouts 
Steve
Theres some great fire engines on here, here is a few from me:
Tired old Dodge
Malton’s finest:
Bruntingthorpe:
Derby:
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The pictures just keep on coming, thanks… Steve the platform you were asking about was built by Saxon originally they were based in Cheshire, on the old ERF site I believe , they used to be Cheshire Fire Engineering (CFE) and then went on to be Saxon. They were great bodybuilders (not the weightlifting type) but sadly, like so many others went down the pan in recent years.
The old Cheshire Dennis (did see see that seamless link?) pictured on another posting appears at one time to have had a winch or similar fitted to the front bumper either that or they put a wing on to keep the front end down at speed which I reckon is highly unlikely with a Dennis! lol.
Hiya …the dodge parked up with bits missing…At saxon they cut the cab in half and fitted a centre panel
to make the cab full width. i only saw one as i,d left and just called in one day. but it look smart and the
idea was to carry more persons. we could make anything at that place, just give us the time.
John
bullitt:
Not a conventional Fire appliance I know but thought you may like to see it, this is a major airport appliance. 1000bhp, can go upto 1250bhp!!! and can weigh in at upto 52 tonnes
Had the pleasure of test driving it last year
bullitt What’s the water and foam tank capacity on that and what engine is it.That description would also have applied to this one but a bit lighter but only around 38 tonnes and 635 horses.
There’s still a Pathfinder at the Yorkshire Air Museum at Elvington… ex Manchester Airport I believe
Hi Glenn, here is the Pathfinder at Elvington, best shot I could get, it was stuck in the corner:
