When I received my operational gear in April 2009, upon graduation from Arlington County’s volunteer indoctrination training program in December 2008, I started out riding Engine 106. Its versatility of running both EMS and fire calls was very appealing, and Truck 106 simply felt way too much for me. The sheer size of the apparatus itself, on top of the several dozens of tools it carried, was very intimidating.
“THE†Truck 106
Until I ran that one structure fire call in Fairfax County on Truck 106 (of which I will get into more detail in a later posting) that had me turn into a ‘truckie,’ running fire calls with the A Platoon under Captain William Bennett, one of ACFD’s finest line officers.
So it was another usual day riding with the ACFD career crew of Truck 106 on 20 November 2009. Only this time, it was a day of a lot of trouble shooting. The original Truck 106 was at the property yard for repairs, and had to ride on Reserve Truck 111 (redesignated as Truck 106 until the original returned). The Arlington County Fire Department runs a total of four aerial ladder trucks: Truck 106 at Station 6 (Falls Church), Truck 105 at Station 5 (Jefferson District), Tower 104 at Station 4 (Clarendon), and Reserve Truck 111 which is usually kept at the Arlington County Property Yard.
T105, TW104 and RT111 have identical chassis, which includes a heavy-duty ladder and a pump on board (Tower 104 has a bucket on its aerial, hence its designation). T106, a 2001 an Emergency-One Cyclone II medium duty aerial ladder truck, does not have a pump. Because of the space taken up by the pumper block of the chassis on RT111, tools have to be rearranged every time T106 goes out of service for routine repairs or emergency maintenance. As such, the crew spent most of the day rearranging the layout for tools.
Reserve Truck 111, redesignated as Truck 106 while the original undergoes repairs
Rearranging tools wasn’t the only task the truck crew had to face. Firefighter Joe Marr, A Platoon’s designated chauffeur and long-time veteran on Truck 106(and one of the very few who can actually get things fixed on T106) noticed the aerial-mounted monitor would not elevate to achieve a straight level. Apparently another crew ran the monitor into another object and left it crooked (fresh scratch marks were found on the mount). So the truck crew ran down to the property yard to remedy the problem.
The damaged aerial ladder-mounted monitor on RT111
The mechanics at the property yard tells the crew that they would have to put the monitor out of service, which would leave RT111 without a monitor to execute master stream operations. FF Marr suggests that they swap the monitor on the original T106 (which was at the property yard at the time; it wasn’t going anywhere anyways). And so the operation to swap monitors begins.
CPT Bennett works on releasing the bolts securing the aerial ladder-mounted monitor on T106
Firefighter Runion shows off his big guns while carrying the monitor from the original T106
Firefighters Gorman (right) and Marr work on removing the damaged monitor mounted on RT111’s aerial ladder. Note the scuffmarks on the waterway.
The aerial ladder on RT111 extended into one of the maintenance bays at the Arlington County Property Yard during nozzle replacement
The tip of the aerial ladder on RT111, minus the nozzle turret
Aerial-mounted nozzle being installed on to RT111
Firefighters Gorman (right) and Marr checks the range of motion of the newly mounted monitor
Later we return to the station, where I assist FF Marr in hooking RT111 onto a hydrant, filling the on-board water tank, and operating the pump panel while he makes manual adjustments on the monitor while water was being pushed out.
Reserve Truck 111
The day went by without any calls, which is a good thing. We were there to do the job right, and that we did.
Another day of preserving life and property on Truck 106.
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