Aging fleet idles fire district
A crisis has occurred at the Timberlake Fire District, as Chief Jack Krill idled 17 of 18 fire rigs, one of which is the chief’s personal pickup truck.
Citing safety and mechanical issues, Chief Krill, after discussing the matter with his officers, decided to take this step out of concern for the safety of his firefighters. The proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back was when the gas pedal on one of the fire engines stuck wide open while the chief was test-driving it. Before he could get it stopped, the truck had blown through the railroad crossing, to finally stop at the lumber company west of the station. (No, the truck was not built by Toyota) The following was part of an announcement by the chief:
“On Wednesday the 17th, Gordon Schoonmaker, Fleet Operations Supervisor and Certified Emergency Vehicle Technician with the Spokane Valley Fire Department and one of his assistants will begin the evaluation of all fire department vehicles against the out of service criteria of the Spokane Valley Fire Department Safety and Operations Manual which follows NFPA and other regulatory requirements. This may take about two weeks to evaluate all of the trucks considering at least three to five hours per truck. Their shop rate is $85/hour so we are looking at a cost of at least $8,000 which does not include repairs or parts. Northern Lakes uses this shop for all of their apparatus maintenance and are very pleased with their service and attention to detail.”
This equipment emergency was allegedly brought on by years of neglect which finally caught up to the district. Failure to ask for bond issues to fix the problems were attributed to anti-tax initiatives by local residents. It would appear that this is no longer an option and that a bond levy vote is preordained for the near future. Chief Krill went on to say:
“The final resolution: all fire apparatus are out of service except for V2 (1986 International engine), which only has one apparent out-of-service issue that we know of – the headlight high beam foot switch (when you turn the high beams on, everything goes dark, which startled me the other night test driving it on a dark road). It’s particularly concerning because this truck is a manual transmission and you are driving with two feet anyway. We just got a new switch installed this morning and that specific problem is solved.”
Several local citizens have expressed concerns about the lack of protection during this time of evaluation. Chief Krill points out that all of the neighboring fire departments, including Spirit Lake, Rathdrum and Northern Lakes, have mutual assistance agreements with Timberlake and will fill in as needed. The district is also trying to locate a spare that other departments might loan to Timberlake for a short time.