This showed up almost directly in front of my house today.
(Please disregard the dandelions.)
As I sat in my office toiling away on my next Curbside Classic masterpiece about a Toyota or perhaps a Nissan, I heard the familiar sound of a large diesel engine and immense weight which I normally associate with trash pickup day.
But Saturday isn’t trash pickup day.
I peered through the blinds to find this pale yellow behemoth stopped out front and noticed that I hadn’t noticed any sirens.
Truth in advertising is not dead because the nice young men who arrived with the truck were, in fact, checking and/or installing smoke detectors. I informed them that mine work fine as they helpfully indicate most instances in which I operate the stove.
They had no objection to my snapping a few quick pictures of their rig, and here we are. This one appears to have ample, uh, knobs and buttons and such. Yes.
I believe the gentleman told me this boom has a 90 foot reach though it would be more fun if it were the 500 my mind briefly imagined.
Though it has since started raining lightly, it’s still a nice day here in SpringVegas, and I thank the kind sirs at the SpringVegas Fire Department for granting my request for some photos.
What a beast! Probably even better looking in resale red.
Actually, that valve panel is pretty nicely laid out. The 1960s engines were puppy-mothers to figure out, even after you remembered that you needed 5th gear to engage the PTO. Ah, the joys of volunteer fire service. Yeah, I prefer them in red, too.
I became a friend of one of the Fire Chiefs at Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD) during the time that I worked on the design and installation of the recently completed Automatic People Mover (APM) system.
The fire/emt vehicles at Dulles (as well as at National in DC) are all painted a bilious green similar to the engine in this article. My friend the Fire Chief told me that everyone in the IAD fire department hated the color and would have much preferred traditional fire engine red. The choice of puke green was a political one that the IAD fire department had no input or influence on.
The photo below shows one of the APMs being unloaded upon initial delivery to the Vehicle Maintenance Facility (VMF) on the southern end of IAD.
I think that there were some studies done in the 1970s indicating that the yellow-green was one of the most visible colors in the spectrum, and that traditional fire engine red was much less so. Fort Wayne, Indiana bought some trucks this color in the late 70s. I moved away but cannot say if they stayed with the color. Indianapolis Fire Department uses good old fashioned red.
I recall hearing of such studies, too. In retrospect, I figure such research just showed that lighter color paints looked brighter under weak headlights than darker color paints. With improved headlights and a greater ability to make surfaces reflective (tape, paint, panels) the rationale should have weakened. Local jurisdictions in Northern Virginia have switched from lime back to red with reflectorized white striping.
These days a combination of conspicuity tape and LED strobes make any vehicle plenty visible at night. Even with worst case conditions of fog or heavy snow I can see them a good 1/4mile+ away.
I grew up in a town so conservative (stuffy?) that the fire trucks were DARK GREEN! Still are, although apparently somebody complained about the poor visibility. I am told that now the cab roofs are pale yellow.
My current home uses a golden yellow with royal blue trim – not bad looking, and certainly visible, though I, personally, still like the red.
I don’t care about the fact that there are dandelions in your yard because I like them.
Well, if I wasn’t so lazy, they’d have been sprayed already this year.
They don’t seem to have changed much in a decade, the Sutphen SP95 is a midmount Aerial Platform that
I once got a ride in a fire engine similar to this in Memphis. Me and two of my friends were waiting for a cab after a concert and party. We had told the cab company to pick us up outside the fire station since we didn’t really know where we were. We got to talking with one of the fire fighters and they gave us a ride back to our hotel – they even sounded the sirens when they took off.
These things are something else than what we have in Denmark.
Here we are getting in:
Would this have a Detroit Diesel engine, by chance? Any details about the powerplant?
There’s a very good reason why kids, especially boys love fire engines – hook and ladders are mt favorite. I always wondered how the guy steered in the back. That looked like it was the coolest job in the world!
For the record – I don’t care about scientific color studies – that beast needs to be red for my seal of approval…
Wow 30 meters vertical is tall but I prefer RED