ANDOVER — Fire Chief Jim Adler is glad to announce the town’s Fire Department has received its new 2023 tanker truck as of last Wednesday.

The Freightliner tanker truck was delivered from Midwest Fire manufacturer in Minnesota, Adler said on Thursday. “It’s replacing our 1975 American LaFrance (truck), which was grossly outdated and in disrepair,” he said. The fire department has had the 1975 truck since the early 1990s, he estimates, and it was purchased used at that time.

Adler, the town’s fire chief for five years, got residents’ approval to purchase the new tanker at the Town Meeting in 2021. “I had been trying for a couple years (to purchase a new truck), and I think a chief before me had got the notion out there we really need to do something.

“(The new truck is) a good commitment from the fire department to the town, and it’s a good commitment from the town to the fire department. You know, giving us the ability to purchase this tanker was very important; we’re very thankful.”

Adler sees the new tanker as “a fabulous upgrade” that will be a good asset to the town. Tanker 42, the new truck, will primarily be used to shuttle water to Engine 41, their “frontline engine” and the first to go out whenever there is a fire. Another fire truck, Engine 43, is like Engine 41, but it’s also used to supply water to 41. “So, it’s a process when you fight a structure fire,” he explained.

Currently, the town’s all-volunteer fire department has about 20 volunteers with an average of five to 12 people at a time going out to fight a fire, Adler said. The department covers firefighting services for Andover as well as other Oxford County towns and unorganized territories, extending an estimated 8-9 miles to South Arm and about 6-7 miles to Upton, he said.

The Andover fire department also receives mutual aid when firefighting from its surrounding towns: Roxbury, Rumford, Mexico, Newry, Bethel, Dixfield, Peru, Woodstock and Greenwood, “because really no one fire department can handle a structure fire; no one fire department has enough manpower or equipment,” Adler explained.