Ahh, the good old days when the second largest urban area in the U.K. had a proper well-equipped, fit-for-purpose brigade. 62 pumps and ten aerials?!!! Imagine that! Today I think they've got 40 pumps and 4 aerials. They'll tell you they've "modernised". But is removing around 20 pump ladders and six aerial appliances from the fleet, and adding forty next to useless pick-up trucks modernisation? It's shocking the way austerity has slashed away at their fleet, putting the people they are there to serve at unnecessary risk. I don't think there's another brigade in the country that has been savaged as much as WMFS. And all those beautiful Dennises! Brilliant video, and a great trip down Nostalgia Avenue.
YelpBullhorn yes it’s very sad. The LFB and Merseyside have taken an equally big hit and their latest IRMP has proposed further cuts. Very sad times which don’t seem to be ending.
john linden...... my local brigade, Staffordshire, has had to endure huge cuts too. We've lost eight proper pumps, but have gained a few of these light pumps based on a sprinter van. Hmmm. But apparently they are actually better than a full-sized fire engine! Who'd have thought. And where once we had 4 aerials, we now have two. Five rescue tenders became two, became one. One! And I think that is jump crewed. Take Stafford. Not many moons ago it ran two pumps, an ALP, an RT and a line rescue unit, all wholetime manned. Only a single pump and the line rescue unit now remain. Granted Stafford gained a single-pump retained station to the south-west of the town, but that was only because when the "powers-that-be" sold the centrally-located station site to Asda, and built an impressive 4 bay station to the north-east of the town, it soon transpired that fire crews were unable to achieve their response times to the other side of town, and so had to build another station! You couldn't make it up. But I think ineptitude is another story altogether.....
8:43 my college teacher was one of the firefighters there, told us them AWG branches were absolutely useless unless you had to get water in tight space. They were all pleased when they switched to Akrons in the early 00s
Great video I was in the retained in devon from 89 to 2000 they ran Dennis appliances loved every minute of it
Ahh, the good old days when the second largest urban area in the U.K. had a proper well-equipped, fit-for-purpose brigade. 62 pumps and ten aerials?!!! Imagine that! Today I think they've got 40 pumps and 4 aerials. They'll tell you they've "modernised". But is removing around 20 pump ladders and six aerial appliances from the fleet, and adding forty next to useless pick-up trucks modernisation? It's shocking the way austerity has slashed away at their fleet, putting the people they are there to serve at unnecessary risk. I don't think there's another brigade in the country that has been savaged as much as WMFS.
And all those beautiful Dennises! Brilliant video, and a great trip down Nostalgia Avenue.
YelpBullhorn yes it’s very sad. The LFB and Merseyside have taken an equally big hit and their latest IRMP has proposed further cuts. Very sad times which don’t seem to be ending.
john linden...... my local brigade, Staffordshire, has had to endure huge cuts too. We've lost eight proper pumps, but have gained a few of these light pumps based on a sprinter van. Hmmm. But apparently they are actually better than a full-sized fire engine! Who'd have thought. And where once we had 4 aerials, we now have two. Five rescue tenders became two, became one. One! And I think that is jump crewed. Take Stafford. Not many moons ago it ran two pumps, an ALP, an RT and a line rescue unit, all wholetime manned. Only a single pump and the line rescue unit now remain. Granted Stafford gained a single-pump retained station to the south-west of the town, but that was only because when the "powers-that-be" sold the centrally-located station site to Asda, and built an impressive 4 bay station to the north-east of the town, it soon transpired that fire crews were unable to achieve their response times to the other side of town, and so had to build another station! You couldn't make it up. But I think ineptitude is another story altogether.....
Good old days of graham meldrum so glad I got out and didn’t stay in.
Even my local brigade H&W are starting to use them Iveco things that D&S are using. Along with 3 stations being merged into 1
I thought the second largest was GMC? Had a lot more than 62 pumps back in the day.
8:43 my college teacher was one of the firefighters there, told us them AWG branches were absolutely useless unless you had to get water in tight space. They were all pleased when they switched to Akrons in the early 00s
My grandad george fenton was a fireman there a very long time ago.
This is a fantastic video. Where did u get it from