Keith Bryant
The Bella Vista Fire Department recently took steps to ensure its ladders are up to par.
On March 27, Richie Ring, aerial inspector with CFS Inspectors, used a small crane mounted on the side of his work truck to heft a 1,000-pound load onto a set of straps to test the strength of Ladder 1's aerial ladder. He tested it at different angles, he said, and performed other tests. Other ladders, he said, are tested with a 500-pound load.
"We really torture them," he said. One test, he said, is the drift test, in which he raises the aerial to a steep angle and measures any change in its position. Ladder 1, he said, ended up with far more travel than is acceptable, possibly indicating a hydraulic issue.
Deputy Chief Bryan Wolfgang said that learning about issues like this is exactly what these tests are for. The truck in question was headed for the shop to correct this issue.
"Nothing major," he said. "Just something we have to fix."
The annual tests are designed to make sure that the department is in line with National Fire Prevention Association standards and ensure that the city's firefighters have safe, effective equipment to work with, Wolfgang said.
"If they'll hold ... 500 pounds," he said, "they're not going to fail with what we do to them."
General News on 04/05/2017