Essex County Fire and Rescue Service - Appliances

Appliances

ECFRS has the following fire appliances in operation:

• 50 Rescue Pumps: the standard firefighting vehicle mobilised to all emergency calls.

These appliances are equipped with a high-pressure two-stage main pump also capable of making foam via an onboard foam inductor system, two high-pressure hose reels, a set of rescue ladders, a light portable fire pump, four breathing apparatus sets, two spare breathing air cylinders and hydraulic rescue equipment, as well as other miscellaneous tools.

• 20 Water Tenders: similar to the Rescue Pump except with less emphasis on rescue equipment and greater water capacity.

In addition, there are a number of specialised appliances:

• 5 Aerial Ladder Platforms (ALP): extendible ladder platforms with rescue cages, stretchers and additional lighting, these vehicles provide high-level access and firefighting capability, with a vertical reach of almost 100 ft, almost 80 ft sideways, and up to 55 ft below ground level.
• 4 Light Water Tenders (Steyr Pinzgauers) (LWrT)
• 4 Rescue Tenders (RT): these lorries are fitted with forklift trucks, enhanced rescue gear including vehicle stabilisation and heavy-lift air bags, specialist casualty stretchers, casualty stabilisation and first aid equipment, an inflatable boat and salvage gear.
• 3 Foam Tenders (FT): introduced in 2011, these new units are cheaper to maintain and easier to use than the previous dated vehicles, and can provide state-of-the-art foam proportioning equipment for transport incidents and refinery fires.
• 2 Control Units (CU)
• 3 Fireboats (Fbt)
• 2 Water Bowsers (WrB)
• 1 Hose Layer (HL)
• 1 Animal Rescue Unit (ARU): introduced in April 2011, the ARU is based on an all-terrain Unimog chassis and is fitted with a Hiab crane capable of extending up to 13.7 m and lifting weights of up to 3,250 kg. The vehicle is also equipped with three 'pods' containing all the equipment that crews might need to carry out specialist animal rescues; its crew is specially trained in large animal rescue and welfare.
• 2 Flood Response Units (FRU): two additional FRUs will be added to the fleet in the future.
• 1 Welfare Module (WM)
• 1 Environmental Module (EM): to help crews contain pollutants at incidents, this unit carries a wide range of equipment including pumps, oil and chemical absorbent materials, booms, drain-blockers and over-drums for containing leaking chemical containers. It was launched in July 2011.

The service is also reviewing requirements for a breathing apparatus tender. The standard appliances (Rescue Pumps and Water Tenders) are crewed by at least four and as many as six firefighters, while specialist units such as the Aerial Ladder Platforms and Rescue Tenders are crewed by a minimum of two.

USAR appliances, based at Lexden, include:

• 1 Incident Response Unit (based at Chelmsford) (IRU)
• 1 High Volume Pump (HVP)
• 5 prime movers with various demountable pods
• 1 Search Dog Unit
• 1 USAR personnel carrier
• 1 Detection, Identification and Monitioring (DIM) vehicle

The service's driving school is at Chelmsford, and is home to three emergency fire appliance driving (EFAD) pumps and two multi-purpose driver training lorries.

Training centres at Wethersfield and Witham each have two designated training pumps.