Tahoe Firefighters dig out buried hydrants

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

Tahoe Firefighters dig out buried hydrants

Mountain area Residents: Please assist your local Fire Department and dig out a snowbound fire hydrant near your home, You will be helping to protect your community and your home.

With the beautiful weather forecast for next few days, It would also be a good time to check address markers and other important street signs near your home possibly blocked by snow or damaged in the storms.

Crews work overtime to dig snow from water sources

By Jenny Goldsmith
Sierra Sun, jgoldsmith@sierrasun.com

Firefighters need water to successfully extinguish a blaze, but with towering snow berms bordering area roadways, digging out the hydrants can be a daunting task.

With several feet of snow blanketing the region, nearly half of the hydrants in the Truckee Fire Protection District and North Tahoe Fire Protection District are still covered with compacted snow, district officials said.

“We’re currently using personnel on overtime to help dig out the hydrants,” said Gene Welch, Truckee Fire’s public safety and information officer. “It can be a monumental task.”

In the last week, Truckee Fire has spent over 300 man-hours digging out hydrants, Welch said.

He said the district focuses on the town’s main arteries first, as well as hydrants covered by deeper berms. But with the recent heavy storms, Welch said locating the hydrants has been difficult.

“We have markers at the hydrants, but because the storms have been coming at such a rapid succession, we have to use metal detectors to find the markers,” he said.

The North Tahoe Fire Protection District has hired contractors to assist with uncovering the district’s 800 hydrants, particularly in higher elevations where deep snowpack requires heavy equipment.

To supply water in the meantime, the district utilizes a water tender — an engine that carries 2,500 gallons of water for firefighting, said Chief Duane Whitelaw of the North Tahoe Fire Protection District.

“We don’t want to find ourselves in a situation where we run out of water because a hydrant was covered, and we’re frantically trying to uncover it while concurrently putting out a fire,” Whitelaw said.

Source: Sierra Sun

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Tuesday, February 12, 2008