When most in our community think of fire calls, they think that most happen in the populated areas of Drumheller.
Often that is not the case and fire crews are required to head into the rural areas of town, including the badlands. Drumheller Fire now has a new tool to make responding to rural fires and badland rescues. According to Fire Chief Derian Rosario, the new piece of equipment is in essence repurposing an older piece of equipment. “This week we took delivery of our new brush truck. Some are aware that over the last year, we’ve had a replacement of our rescue unit. What we did was repurpose the chassis of that rescue unit, turning it into a brush truck, putting a brush deck on it. Saving the community well over $100,000 in the purchase of that new chassis and we’re able to get a capital piece of equipment to protect the valley in a very quick way.”
The purpose of this vehicle is to get to the harder to access areas of the valley, shares Fire Chief Rosario. “This is going go into the more rural areas of our community. If were going up the sides of the valley, or into the Hoodoos, or anything like that, where we need to have a light, nimble, quick attack truck, this is what that is designed for. It is going to out, take its water and pump into the area that it is needed, and put it out where we can’t put the big trucks.”
The need is there for this piece of equipment for the fire department. “It’s a critical piece of equipment when it comes down to that rural response,” acknowledges Fire Chief Rosario. “In town, we don’t need it as much, we have the hydrants and the big trucks can do the job but a little truck that’s nimble, being able to go in where it needs to be, to put out that grass fire before gets away on us, is a great asset to us.”
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