To the rescue BY SARA KEDDY Kings County Register If the fire alarm rings, the rescue truck rolls. Waterville and District Volunte

To the rescue



BY SARA KEDDY

Kings County Register



If the fire alarm rings, the rescue truck rolls.

Waterville and District Volunteer Fire Department’s newest “member” is a custom-built emergency response truck.

“Rescue goes to every call with a crew of six: it’s our operations centre, it has the jaws of life, spare air, a generator - everything,” says truck Captain Kevin Ernest.

Waterville welcomed its new truck just before Christmas, but spent a month training volunteers on its specialized features: “There’s a lot of fine arts and technical things,” Ernest says, not least of which is a $20,000 set of extendable command lights, paid for by the department’s auxiliary, that can “light up a football field.

“At night scenes when we have lights, now we can raise this right overhead so we won’t be working in shadows. The truck can sit out on a road or at the end of a driveway and still light up a scene.”

Another reason for the delay in service: the size of the truck itself. The old rescue unit was basically a 20-foot cube van; the new vehicle is a 35-foot machine. Driver training was a must; nine department members are now ready to get behind the wheel.

Despite it’s size, “no spot is unused,” Ernest says.

“Extra crew rides in the cab now: nobody rides in the back, and that was a safety issue.”

Equipment is stored in specific outside cabinets with roll-out shelving and roll-up doors: nothing to hinder firefighters’ access to the gear they need. The new rescue unit was a two-year project, with meetings beginning in June 2005 between the department and the Cornwallis Square Village Commission. Ernest says the original plan was to finance the truck’s $420,000 cost but, in 2006, the village said it would float the loan itself. The fire department has since kicked in $229,000 of fundraised money on its own; there’s just $103,000 left to pay already.

The truck’s cab and frame came from a Michigan plant. Lantz Truck Body Limited in Port Williams outfitted it with Waterville’s specific design.

“There are a lot of department’s drooling over this truck,” Ernest says.