Wednesday, October 12, 2005

It was very overcast again in Louisville this morning. I checked out of the motel at 0830 hours and gassed up the car ($1.63/gallon). I headed to Louisville Station 8 on the far southeast side. My next stop was Station 20. The engine was parked outside as crews were digging up the apparatus bay floor for new pavement. I got a photo of the engine and medic rig and asked a firefighter about what was happening with the medic service in the city. He sent me to talk to a female paramedic.

The current mayor thinks the ambulance service will work better if it’s a separate agency. So he’s taking the EMS personnel out of the fire department and putting them in a separate division. Most, if not all, of the ambulances are still running from LFD Stations in the same FD red rigs. They will be painted gray and blue eventually. The paramedics/EMT’s on the ambulances are now part of the Teamsters Union. The fire department had been operating the ambulance service since 1994. Most firefighters are not happy to see the ambulance crews put in a separate division. Most firefighters here seem to despise the mayor as he has been replacing the engines and trucks with quints.

I headed to Station 11, with Engine 11 and Truck 7, whose personnel operates the Heavy Rescue truck. When I arrived there was a spare engine outside running. It was an well-weathered 1978 Pirsch “Auxiliary” piece. Truck 7 was also using an “Auxiliary,“ a 1979 Pirsch 100-foot tractor-trailer. They pulled it out so I could get photos and then pulled out the Heavy Rescue also. I was happy to be able to get photos of the old Pirsch rigs.

I now had completed seeing all the LFD stations (in the last three trips here). I had also visited most of the department stations back in the early 80s. The LFD might be the third oldest paid department in the US, behind Cincinnati (#1) and St. Louis (#2). The LFD was a paid department starting in 1858.

I headed to LFD Headquarters (Station 2) to see Lt. Colonel Cletus Blandford, who is an Assistant Chief now and was responsible for most of the work done at the LFD Museum at Station 22. He invited me up to his office and we had a nice chat about their museum and some expansion they are planning. It was very nice of him to take the time. He also showed me a copy of their latest LFD Yearbook, which was very impressive. He also gave me a LFD patch and a fire prevention cube they are gave away to kids for fire prevention week.

I left Louisville around 1100 hours and headed south on I-65 towards Nashville. Karlye’s flight was due in at 1500 hours. I stopped at the Goodlettsville FD, just inside Davidson County. It is one of just a few departments that are still around in the county. They cover a rather large northern area of the county and the Nashville FD operates a medic rig from their quarters.

When I pulled up to the station I could see the rear door of the station was open. I looked in and could not believe my eyes. The fire apparatus was all backed in farmer style on both sides of the huge apparatus floor. It looked more like a truck dealership than a fire station. The super-large station was designed by their chief and is quite the facility. The station can easily hold 12 rigs. I’ve never seen a station like it before- that’s for sure.

I stopped at nearby Nashville Station 31, home of Engine 31, Engine 38 and Medic 31. This station is actually one of the busiest in the department, even though it is in the north east corner of the county. They had a trailer parked next to the station, so I asked what that was for. “It’s the Captain’s trailer,” I was told. The station was only designed for one engine and a medic unit. With the addition of Engine 38, they needed more room. So they had a trailer moved in for the captains to live in. New Station 38 will be built at Larkin Springs and Old Hickory in the near future.

I headed out around the east end of the county to Station 36- way out in the country in the little town of Old Hickory. They operate with a three-person engine company there, as do most of the NFD companies. I kept heading south to Station 32. Quartered there are Engine 32 and Medic 32. The medic rig was built by Excellance of Alabama and is a modular style they have gone to here. They love them. They plan to remount the back ends on up to three chassis total. Medic 32’s rig is only 21 months old and has 78,000 miles logged.

I had time to visit one more station before Karyle’s plane came in. I kept heading south- way south to NFD Station 33, home of Engines 33 and 35. Engine 33 was out and I got photos of it. Work crews were working on Engine 35’s broken ladder rack in the station. They no longer have a fire department shop here. All apparatus repairs are done by private contractors. I was told that they have contractors here that guarantee to make room and start working immediately on any NFD rigs the moment they are driven into their repair facility. Firefighters said it works great. Maybe that is why they use the commercial chassis for most of their pumpers (with the exception of the downtown engine companies).

I headed to the airport to pickup Karyle. One of the firefighters told me where I could park and watch planes near the postal facility at the airport. There weren’t too many planes to watch. It is a very dead airport. Karyle got in around 1530 hours. We headed to our motel a few miles away. Tomorrow morning were off to Chattanooga for a night. We return Friday afternoon and will check into the timeshare unit near Opryland for a week stay.

It was warm here today. I think it got up to 80 in Nashville today. That’s all for now.