Fire Service shows off new trucks
The Minister responsible for the National Fire Service many months ago made a commitment that Belize’s fire fighters would one day soon get the equipment they needed to do their job. Today that moment finally arrived.
Janelle Chanona, Reporting
For many years, the National Fire Service has been something of a public whipping boy. It appeared that fire fighters were neither properly trained, properly equipped or properly motivated. Increasingly, Belizean fire fighters have been participating in formal training exercises both at home and abroad, but a lack of equipment has still been a big drawback for the service. Today however, the Fire Department broke in some much needed equipment, namely four brand new, yes brand new fire trucks and other key accessories. And as the new rides sat shining in the sun, the fire fighters were all too ready to show off their stuff, complete with sound effects.
The ride wasn’t smooth sailing but at least we found out the trucks can move, and fast, and better yet, they can maneuver through some of Belize City’s more crowded streets. For an encore, they made sure the pumps really work. The question now is whether the glitter and glamour will make a difference.
Henry Baizar, Fire Chief
“Yes we receive this equipment, but there’s only so much we can do. We depend on the public in general to inform us in time when there’s a fire. It’s useless that they inform us when the house is almost burnt and then when we get there, then there are lots of complaints that we have these beautiful equipments, these sophisticated equipments and the houses are still burning down. So if we get the call on time and we get there on time, we will do our best to ensure that the house or houses do not burn down.”
These new trucks are custom made for fighting fires in Belize, according to the requirements set by fire officials here. Baizar says by the end of this month, another truck, ordered specifically for the San Pedro branch should be arriving in the country.
Janelle Chanona
“Now I know that all the Belize City residents are excited about having new fire trucks, but everybody out in the districts is wondering, “what happen to us?” What’s the situation there?”
Henry Baizar
“The situation here is that we need much more vehicles that we have here. Presently Belize City is the area where the fire load is and fires occur more frequently and are bigger fires, so we need our best equipment in Belize City. We have other vehicles that we were using in Belize, those vehicles will be sent out to the more needy areas at this time until we can get some more vehicles.”
“These vehicles are new, they need to be run in, the guys need to be train on them and the people who know about the vehicles are here in Belize City and that’s another reason why they are staying in Belize City. Eventually after the trucks are broken in and other people know about them we might consider sending a few of them out of the city and keeping some of the other vehicles here.”
Dickie Bradley, Minister Responsible for National Fire Service
“There should no longer be any concern from the public that there is a shortage of equipment, that they no have enough water, we should hear that. The yew to that is that there is an ongoing training program where in fact they do live simulations they come out to various parts of the city and in the districts and actually go through what would happen in the event of fire in different localities, different types of houses, different types of neighborhoods. So at the same time that we were ordering equipment, we were upgrading the fire skills of the fire fighters. The second phase Janelle, is that in the coming weeks you will be seeing public information going out because we’ll be forming a formal volunteer fire fighting service to compliment the fire fighters who are on duty 24 hours.”
Today there was no denying that the new equipment has given the fire service a big boost in terms of morale. The coming months will determine whether the investment will help put out the fires.
Janelle Chanona for News Five.
The new fire tenders and pumps were made by Kovatch Mobile Equipment Corporation with a price tag of 2 million dollars. The other equipment, which includes water tanks, fire hoses and lights, is estimated to have cost around $300,000. The department says in addition to the other truck for San Pedro, three new portable pumps should also be arriving later this month. The purchase of all this new equipment was made possible through a financing arrangement with the Crown Agents of the United Kingdom.
