011111 NORTH MONTGOMERY COUNTY FIRE DEPARTMENT LAYS 8200 FEET OF FIRE HOSE

Описание: When North Montgomery County Fire Department was dispatched to the lumber yard fire Thursday morning they had already had plenty of experience bringing the massive amounts of water needed to the fire. FM 1097 was closed as were the railroad tracks as the hose was laid across it from another hydrant.

The hydrant is the big word here. In the city they have it, some subdivisions have it but the remaining part of the district is without. With the shortage of fire, hydrants come to the high homeowner's insurance, Without enough water on a fire property damage tends to be more extensive.

Over the past two years Chief Robinson, his firefighters, and his ESD board did extensive work to bring their ISO rating down. The I.S.O. rating of a community has a direct effect on the insurance premiums that individuals pay on their homes and especially on commercial buildings. The lower the I.S.O. rating on a scale of 1 to 10, the better the insurance rates are (generally). The I.S.O. reviews 3 areas primarily – the Fire Department; water main & hydrant capabilities; and 9-1-1 dispatch & paging services.

Chief Robinson set out across the district looking at locations of hydrants, ponds and other water sources and how far they were from structures. With ponds, there are several ways to use the water through drafting. Basically, the pump pulling the water from the pond and pushing that large volume of water at over one hundred pounds pressure to the next fire truck. That truck then once again boosts the pressure so that by the time it reaches the fire or the last pumper there is plenty of water and pressure.

Chief Robinson decided to change some of that. One was to take the pumpers between the water source and the fire out of the equation. Most of the time over long distances they are needed to keep the water flowing. An example is your garden hose. Plenty of pressure at the faucet but due to what is called friction loss by the time it reached the end of your one hundred foot garden hose the pressure drops drastically.

Last Thursday County Commissioner Mike Meador and his crews closed on the lane of Longstreet Road for over two miles. The North Montgomery County Fire Department was about to try something that has never been done in the state. Lay eight thousand feet of fire hose and have at least 500 gallons per minute of water flow at the other end. Basically making a water main to a fire hydrant within a short distance of fire.

The ESD Board had approved the purchase of a utility gooseneck trailer and 8000 feet of hose a short time back. Thursday was the day to test Robinson's theory and to show the ISO Inspectors when they came to town in a few weeks that it could be done and convince them to drop the area ISO rating.

Just after noon, the trucks lined up and the signal was given. The crew pulled the suction hose from the trailer and the first section of hose. As the trailer load of hose pulled away at 35MPH (what the hose is rated to be laid at) the crew connected the truck to the hose and started drafting from the pond. Within minutes water began to flow. The truck continued down Longstreet Road and around the bend. As it pulled up to the engine where the engine started flowing water to the imaginary fire. It is also a timed event. They must be flowing at least 500gpm to the fire within twenty minutes of the start of the exercise.

Flowing at 250gpm from the tank the crew connected the hose to the truck. What seemed the longest was watching the hose slowly fill with water and seeing it slowly come to you.

At the 14 minute mark, the firefighters were flowing over 750 gallons per minute on the imaginary fire, surpassing the required 500 gallons per minute and beating the twenty-minute clock by over five minutes.

North Montgomery County Fire Department is only one of the departments working toward lowering the ISO rating. Grangerland and Bennette Fire Departments now combined as Caney Creek Fire Department has been working over a year to bring theirs down also. Just last week they were notified that their 10.0 rating has been dropped to a 3.9. This will be a major saving to homeowners and businesses in their district. The next step is at the end of the month ISO notifying the Texas Board of Insurance. Once that is done insurance companies will have the information available to them for rating.

Porter Fire Department is currently working to lower they're also as are most of the county departments.