JAY – A technical services specialist has recommended that the Jay Fire Rescue Department adopt an apparatus replacement program.

The plan calls for:

• In 2005, replacing Engine No. 3 with a rescue/pumper.

• In 2015, replacing Engine No. 2 with a rescue/pumper.

• In 2020, replacing Engine No. 1 and Tanker No. 1 with a pumper/tanker.

• In 2025, replacing Ladder No. 1 with a “quint” – a combination pumper/aerial ladder.

• Replacing brush trucks as needed basis, utilizing low-cost, recycled vehicles.

This would give the North Jay Station a rescue/pumper and a pumper/tanker, and the Chisholm Station a rescue/pumper and a quint, according to Neil Courtney, a technical services specialist from Maine Fire Training and Education at Southern Maine Technical College.

Courtney stated in a review of the department’s equipment that this would reduce the current configuration of five large, single-utility pieces of equipment to four versatile, combination vehicles.

The need for a reserve pumper would be eliminated, he explained, because the four proposed new acquisitions would all have rated pumps and meet the intent of the National Fire Protection Association standards.