I'm fairly new to this whole bloggin' thing. But, I wanted to throw out my "props" and "kudos" to the Bellingham City Council for their approval to award a bid to replace 6 fire engines (and one ladder truck on a side bet) for the city. This unprecedented action not only will improve our operations (and citizen safety), but will reduce out of service time and maintenance costs. Yes, we will be repaying interest into the City firefighter pension fund, and we fully understand the huge commitment this places on the city. However, we felt borrowing money from ourselves - and therefore repaying ourselves- was a much better proposition than paying someone else the interest. We studied the options to death, and as was so aptly stated in the movie "Apollo 13"... " Gene, from where I sit, this is our only option" We had to catch up.

Thanks Councilor Snapp (you'll always be Chief Snapp to me) for your endorsement (even with some reservations) We're doing our best to spend your funds wisely.

Parkenfarker..... the engines won't have CAFS...... unlike you Lummi Island boys, in almost all areas of the city we have plenty of H2O, thanks to Public Works.

Bill Boyd

Hi Flat Tire,
As I just joined this forum, I haven't quite figured out how to post replies, so I apologize for providing you the information twice. This message is for everyone else who didn't get the message I guess I sent just to you last night.

Admin Note: To help out Chief Boyd, I've edited to turn these into quotes, for clarity:

Our Public Works Fleet Division and our department are recommending reducing the life span (replacement cycle) for fire apparatus from 20-25 years to 15 years. 12 years in front line service, and 3 years in reserve status. Before now, we replaced rigs 1-2 at a time, resulting in different manufacturers, designs, and construction.


We have 6 front line engines (range from 7-21 years old), 2 reserve engines (27 years old) 1 front line ladder truck (10 years old), 1 reserve ladder truck (27 years old) The fleet average age is 16 years.


We anticipate needing to replace 2 more engines and a ladder truck around 2014.


Well, as you can see by the age of our apparatus above, they can last a looooong time. However, Fleet's analysis of the cost/benefit of keeping fire engines reliable running begins to yield diminishing returns around 12 years. Therefore, we recommended lowering our replacement timeframe and replacing an apparatus at 12 years, and moving it into reserve status for 3 more years. Then, we would surplus/sell it.


With the six apparatus we are replacing now, they will be either surplused or sold to another fire department, depending on the age/condition of the individual apparatus. I anticipate the 1981 units won't have much value. However, some of the late 80's early 90's apparatus may be purchased by another fire department - typically a smaller volunteer department with low call volume and low tax base that would allow them to purchase new apparatus.

Hope this information helps.

Whoever the Admin was, Damon???, he needed covering. I told him to answer the questions here and he sent me a curt "Already answered. Try to keep up will ya? :)" I came back to check and nothing, nadda. So Mr. Chief, you out smarted yourself, eh?? This is just like old times...... Stan

I guess, given the price of these things, I wish they would last even longer than they do, but given the lifespan of a standard car, it seems more reasonable. This is not an area wherein I have any expertise at all, so it is good to have feedback from those who do.

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