New fire station for south side
Most of the city’s worst fires have occurred on the south side of the Haulover Creek, but the old capital’s single fire station is located on the north side. That situation is being corrected as today the ground floor was poured as part of a ceremony marking the construction of a new substation on Dolphin Street. Home Affairs Minister Dickie Bradley joined the fire chief as the cement truck did its work.
Dickie Bradley, Min. of Home Affairs
“Fires don’t play politics, fires know no boundaries and so we must be prepared for the sake of all of us that we have an effective, efficient, capable, National Fire Service.”
“And I should tell you here that I want to publicly prostrate myself in front of the fire chief to beg him, on behalf of the residents of the south side of Belize City, that his brand new one million dollar fire truck that is coming in later this year, to try and see if you could have it right here on the right hand side of where I’m standing.”
Stewart Krohn
“How important is it to have a station here as opposed to the one on Freetown Road?”
Henry Baizar, Fire Chief
“The response time will be cut in also fifty percent to be honest with you. With the traffic situation right now in Belize City, with only one station on the north side of Belize City and we have a fire on the south side of Belize in rush hour, it is almost impossible to get here. So it was always the plan of the National Fire Service to have stations on the south side of Belize City.”
Stewart Krohn
“The new fire truck, we’ve been hearing that in a couple months time you’re gonna get a big rig, something the likes of which Belize has never seen. How much is this going to help in your job?”
Henry Baizar
“It will help tremendously. The truck that we are getting, it’s an aerial ladder, it has two tanks, one with water, seven hundred and fifty gallons of water and a seven hundred and fifty-gallon foam tank. The aerial can go a hundred feet in the air, so for these high rise building like the hotels, like Radisson, that will be no problem for us. It will help us tremendously.”
The two-storey building measures thirty-four by fifty-seven feet and will include office space, sleeping quarters and recreation area for the fire fighters. Another south side substation will be built in either the Collet or Lake I division. Bradley is unlikely to see his wish come true for the ladder truck to be based at the new site as the big rig is not suitable as a first response vehicle and is too large for the relatively narrow confines of the Dolphin Street neighbourhood.
