A friend of mine once pondered about buying an old fire engine and he told me that because of the way they are used, i.e. in most cases drive to the place where they are needed and then drive back again, they don’t accumulate much mileage at all through the years of service. It’s not like, say, a delivery lorry that rolls around all day 5-6 days of the week.
But it’s hard mileage. Start and run cold is when you get the most wear along with stop and go traffic. Steady running on the freeway all day is the easiest.
But going hard right at startup, and spending long hours at low speed and idle are precisely what fire equipment is built to do, especially engines. They’re way out of their comfort and design zone scooting along at freeway speeds.
In NYC, you see the FDNY doing this quite frequently. Either in the grocery store, hanging out by the rig at Rockaway beach, in Central Park, even seen them sitting outside of the Columbia football stadium, sitting on top of the truck, eating pizza and watching the game. Never gave it a second thought, other than to be envious! (not taking anything away from firefighters and the dangers they face, but the job does seem to have it’s perks).
Assuming they’re ready to respond, have radio contact, and are in their assigned area. You’re paying them either way, doesn’t really matter if they sit in the firehouse or not.
I just hate it when I pull into the grocery store, and the firemen are using the Haz-Mat truck:eek: for a shopping trip.
This reminds me of the frequent complaints about my husband and a couple of his colleagues’ use of their police cars. Yes, when they stop anywhere - lunch, pee break, domestic disturbance, whatever - they leave their cars running. Taxpayers, of course, whine about the wastefulness. And those taxpayers would have an excellent point except that these cars are clearly marked K9, all over the freaking car. Not real safe here in the hot, muggy south to leave a dog in a vehicle without air conditioning!
Not quite fire engines, but in the same vein - a pair of ambulance officers were at the bakery in the queue behind me to get some tasty, tasty rolls. They’re just standing there chatting quietly, I got called up to be served, they got called up to be served and then I hear “Aw shit” as one of them checks his beeper.
No rolls for the boys in green, they had to truck on out and the next thing I see is their meatwagon peeling out past the shopping mall entrance with blues and twos going. Poor sods just wanted some lunch.
Not a fireman, but in the same vein…
Every Army vehicle comes with a manual that specifies the routine maintenance checks that must be done. These include before/during/after operation. Therefore, every week the Soldiers hop in their Humvee / LMTV / whatever and just drive it in a circle for a few miles… for no other purpose than to check the “during” and “after” parts of the list.
Don’t mention to Sicks Ate about on-duty police officers and restaurants …
We had picked up pizza/italian & were returning to the station when we got a call. By the time we got the patient in to the back of the bus about 15 minutes later it smelled wonderful. The smells were making *the patient *hungry & she insitsted on paying for our (now interupted) dinner - we wouldn’t let her.