It's More Than Just a Truck with Water

Union County Fire & Rescue

Press Release

You can call it a fire truck or a fire engine, but it doesn’t matter because everyone knows what you are talking about, the big red trucks also known as the “fire apparatus.” Everyone has seen a fire apparatus but there are probably some fire apparatus fundamentals that some people do not know.

A fire apparatus is usually classified by the amount of water that it is able to pump, which is defined as gallons per minute or GPM. This means that the fire apparatus, at full capacity, is able to pump that much water each minute. The normal pumping range can be 750 GPM to 1,500 GPM. Some can pump even more. UCFD fire apparatuses are capable of pumping 1,000 to 1,500 GPM.

We also consider how much water a fire apparatus can transport. This water is used on the initial fire attack until other fire apparatus arrive to provide additional water. Most fire apparatus in UCFD carry 1,000 gallons and some have the ability to transport up to 2,000 gallons. We also dispatch multiple fire apparatus to a fire resulting in at least 10,000 gallons of water being transported on the initial structure fire call.

The fire pump and the water are important but there is also the multitude of fire hose and fire/rescue equipment that is transported on a fire apparatus. Each fire apparatus carries at least 1,200 feet of fire hose. This hose is used to transfer water and attack the fire. There is also other equipment such as Self-Contained Breathing Apparatus (SCBA), ropes, power tools, ladders, extrication and firefighting tools, and multiple appliances for connecting hose and moving water.

UCFD has 13 fire stations and each one must have a least one fire apparatus. That fire apparatus must also have the required equipment per Georgia Firefighters Standards and Training Council to certify that apparatus and station.

The cost of a fire apparatus continues to rise. The last purchase of a fire apparatus cost over $680,000 for just the basic apparatus. That did not include the equipment mentioned above. The equipment carried on each fire apparatus is an additional $75,000 to $100,000. Most fire apparatus and equipment are purchased by the 1% Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax (SPLOST).

The department, as well as the citizens of Union County are very fortunate to be able to purchase new fire apparatus and to maintain a reliable fleet of emergency vehicles.