| If you happened to drive through town using Route 48 on Thursday Night between the hours of 5 PM and 9:00 PM, you may have noticed Depot Lane was closed between Route 48 and Oregon Rd. You also would have seen many of the Cutchogue Fire Department fire trucks in the area, with their hoses laid out down the length of Depot Lane.
It was the Annual Hose Test that the Cutchogue Fire Department conducts every year around this time of May.
Fire hoses come under a lot of water pressure when used for fighting fires or during trainings. They also take a lot of abuse since they're constantly dragged off and on to the fire trucks, and get pulled over various terrains as they are put into use fighting house, brush, or vehicle fires. Over time they can fray, separate from their couplings, or can have gasket failures. These can cause major leaks, or worse yet, could be very dangerous to a firefighter if a coupling were to break away from the hose while it was in use fighting a fire. It would be a catastrophe for all if the hose lines brought in to fight a fire were to suddenly rupture and stop the water from reaching the fire.
In order to ensure that the hoses in use are at peak performance and are safe to use, the CFD tests every piece of hose on every fire truck annually. Each truck takes a turn laying out all of its hose. The trucks are tested one at a time (rather than all at once) to make sure there is apparatus ready to roll immediately in case a fire or emergency occurs during this exercise.
The hoses are tested to meet the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) Standard 1962. They are pressurized with water, and all sections of hose and their couplings are inspected for leaks of damages. Any section of hose that is found to be damaged or does not meet the NFPA standard is removed from service and set aside for possible repair and/or replacement.
After the test is complete each section of hose has to be uncoupled and then drained. The hose then gets re-coupled, brushed off and then re-packed onto the truck very carefully. This is a very time consuming process, since the CFD has over 7000 total feet of hose that needs to be tested.
By 9:30 PM, the trucks were all fully re-packed, re-fueled, and ready to go back into service. The Firefighters were then treated to hamburgers, hotdogs and salads back at the firehouse, cooked by the Fire District Commissioners as a "Thank You" for a job well done.
Thank You to all of the Firefighters for your help on this night. |
