Station Supervisor Responds to Criticisms of Water Shortage in Fire Trucks

Kenneth Mortis

Mortis also responded to criticisms that the department’s approach to fighting the fire contributed to its spread. There was also disapproval coming from onlookers over the fact that the fire truck ran out of water and had to leave the burning building to go and refill. Here is how Mortis responded.

Kenneth Mortis, Station Supervisor, National Fire Service

“Let us break it down by the three points. I’ll keep saying that unu late and come without water. That will be a stigma that will define the department long after I am gone. It is unfortunate that we have to keep hearing that and it is no secret, it is no rocket science that regardless of the size of these trucks these trucks has a water tank in them. Our trucks carry anywhere from four hundred gallons to one thousand gallons of water. Once those waters are exhausted from the tanks we need to go and find supplementary supply. To refill these trucks from a hydrant will take fifteen minutes on maximum average to refill and we locate back to the fire scene. Of course while all that is happening there its anything the fire fighters on the scene can do but wait. As far as our strategic approach is concerned, because of the magnitude of that particular fire, our defenses had to semi-focus on what was being burned in an effort to cool it down to allow our team to put up a defensive attack between the two structures. As you can see when that was done the damage was contained to a minimal. If you look at it and wonder why we are doing things the way we are doing, it is just so that we can have a clearer visual, path as to where the fire is headed versus putting my fire men in between two building directly in the path of the fire travel that would then danger the lives of the people.”

Paul Lopez

“How many trucks were in operations?”

Kenneth Mortis

“We had three trucks fully operational. Initially we started with two and had to return to the station for the third one.”