Fire Station Project

Does Augusta Really need a New Station?

Powering the Station

During power outages, the station operates off a “vintage” 1940 era manually started generator. Personnel are required to come

to the station to actually start the generator before it will power the station.

The Radio use to notify the Firefighters operates off of a car battery for a short period of time, hopefully we are made aware that the power is off so that someone can go to the station and start up the old generator and switch the power supply over to it so that the radio will operate. The current generator runs off Diesel fuel.

We must manually switch the power over from DTE to the generator. Manually switching the power

over is very rough on all of the equipment, computers, radios and general station equipment can be damaged

Safety is an issue… Currently none of the circuits are

protected with Ground Fault protection

As you can imagine, the fire station can be a wet environment, Firefighters are always standing in water around the old station, partially because the current floor is uneven and water puddles. Under current conditions, personnel are receiving shocks from equipment. This can be very dangerous.

The Contaminated Medical Waste is stored outside the station We had to build a box to lock up

the Bio-Hazard Container. If we spray for bee’s we can usually gain access to it to place the contaminated blood borne materials in the box inside. We do pad lock the outer box, so that hopefully kids and other curious people can not get into it.

Current Space is Limited

The trucks are stacked in every bay Currently, we have

truck parked behind trucks

When we have some types of fires, we must move trucks out of the bays to get the truck we need out to respond to fires.

This creates a problem when the parking lot has cars in it, there is no where to park the large fire trucks.

Getting Trucks in and out is difficult at best.

As you can see, we have little clearance when moving trucks in an out. They are dangerously close to the walls and luckily no one has been injured when trying to get the apparatus back in the station. Over the years, some equipment has been damaged in the process.

Apparatus Bays...

The two Brush Trucks are parked in behind the Tanker and Rescue. Having to move trucks always

delays our responses on brush fires

You can see that we must climb over one truck to get to the drivers side of the other one. Because of the limited depth of

the bays, the front bumpers of one truck must overlap the rear steps of the others to fit inside

Hose Drying Rack Here you can see the existing

hose drying rack. When we dry hose, it is almost impossible to even get into the Brush truck parked next to the rack

These racks lay down to horizontal. You can see the damage to the racks from being hit at some time or another. This rack sits along side the Rescue and Brush Trucks

The front apron is much too small When the trucks are parked out

front, they are dangerously close to the road.

This creates an extremely hazardous condition for personnel when we must wash trucks, which has to be done outside because there is not enough room inside.

Several Firefighters have almost been hit by passing cars.

Some one is usually posted to watch for passing cars when we have to wash trucks.

Currently, the Breathing Air Compressor is right along side the trucks. Breathing air that is put in our Air

tanks is drawn from the same space as where the trucks park and exhaust their fumes. We have to always make sure we are not trying to back trucks in while the compressor is refilling our air bank

Here you see “the sink” This sink is used for

everything including Contaminated medical

equipment clean up Cleaning our air masks that

we wear on our faces Making coffee Washing up after runs Washing our cups and

silverware Would you like a cup of

coffee?

The Medical Supply Cabinet Here is where we store all of the

medical supplies we use to treat patients. As you can see, some of the equipment has to be stored outside the cabinet in boxes

Right next to the 1980’s vintage Brush Truck exhaust...

Air Compressor to fill Truck Tires

Dryer for the laundry Medical Supply Storage

cabinet Sink Washer for laundry Water Heater Brush 3-2

The Men's bathroom The apparatus Bay rear

Emergency Exit

The Women’s bathroom The refrigerator and

furnace room and storage room

The Office Area

The Chiefs Office Currently the Fire Chief’s office is

very cramped. All of the personnel files are kept

here. Medical incident reports from runs

we have been on are stored here Critical, confidential files are all

stored here

Our Current “Base Radio” This is the main Fire Department

radio It is kept behind a locked door, because that’s the only space available.

This radio is used as the primary radio to initially page all the personnel for emergency response. It is backed up with a car battery that is kept on the floor next to the radio. If the radio fails, the pages do not go out...

The “Officers Room” Here you can see the Officers

Desks. All of the current officers share these two desks.

The Assistant Chief The Fire Inspector The Captain/Training Officer The Lieutenant The two Sergeants

The Training Room Our Training room is also the

Officers room Our Firefighters attend training

weekly. We pack as many as 20-25 Firefighter in the room every week, there is barely enough room to sit, no less have tables to write on when we train.

Amenities include The Chalk board we use is also

the message board, the apparatus assignment board and memo board

The Pull down screen is used to show training slides or training videos

More Amenities include The small TV Monitor along with

the DVD Player for training videos WATCH YOUR HEAD!! The DVD

player hangs down in the instructors path, we try to remember to always tell the instructor first thing to not hit their head…

Our Trophy Display area, we are proud of our past accomplishments, and try to display them for everyone to see.

Does the Fire Department really need a new station? You be the judge...