The Narooma Rural Fire Service brigade has taken delivery of a new Category 7 fire appliance just in time for what expected to be a busy bushfire season.
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Narooma Captain Adrian Cooper officially was handed the keys by Eurobodalla South Group Captain, Mick Anderson on Friday and the rest of his brigade members excitedly checked out the new vehicle.
Mr Anderson said the new appliance was a medium size bushfire firefighting appliance, but had with the same seating capacity, fitting in up to six firefighters, as the brigade’s bigger Category 1 appliance.
“It has a much better ride and is an extremely capable off and on-road vehicle,” he said. “It’s an extremely versatile machine and we are finding from experience that strike teams are asking for Cat 7 appliances more and more.”
Being slightly smaller means the Cat 7 can get into rugged bush areas and along narrow fire trails better than the larger Cat 1 appliances, he said.
“It can get to places, the Cat 1 just can’t get to,” he said.
The new appliance has a range of safety features including an infrared camera fitted to the front that allows those on board to see through smoke, a reversing camera on the back, very bright LED lights around the vehicle and the “halo system” that sprays water over the vehicle and its tyres.
Mr Cooper said the Cat 7 appliance carried 1800 litres of water and was “generally a very nice truck” with lots of extra storage space and automatic hose reels that save the firefighters’ backs.
The Narooma brigade now had the Cat 1, Cat 7 and Cat 9 appliances, the latter being a more mobile Nissan Patrol four-wheel-drive.
As with all RFS brigades, the Narooma brigade was always keen to recruit new firefighting members and Mr Cooper encouraged anyone interested in becoming a volunteer firefighter with the RFS to come down to the station and check out the new appliance.
The RFS brigades in the Narooma area meanwhile have been busy with ongoing training, including a special training day at Dalmeny last month.