When you live in a Rural Area you water is supplied by a well on your property there is no City water being supplied from a municipal water source. This also means there are no Fire Hydrants at the ready like you have in the city .
To get around this problem fire depts set up what are known as Dry Hydrants on local lakes ,ponds , creeks and rivers so that they have a reliable water source which they must tanker to each location.
Dry Hydrants are basically a large diameter pipe which is sunk to the botom of the water source where a catch basin brings water into the pipe and filters out debris. A fire tanker pulls up and either has a suction pump and pulls water up thru the piping or a fire engine does it for them and then the water is trucked to the fire scene where a large portable dump pool is set up and the water is dumped which fire engines on scene draw from. Because of the way dry hydrants are piped to the bottom of the water source even if the lake or river is frozen water is still available to be drawn ., as only the top couple inches of water is usually only frozen .
Dry Hydrants today use mostly heavy wall PVC type pipe while in past they used steel which required more maintenance and replacement due to rust. If you travel thru rural New Bethlehem Pa.
you might encounter this dry hydrant when you visit the local park.
There mostly tucked out of the way but always ready to serve because getting reliable water to fight a fire in rural areas is critical .Many depts now use a CAF system Compressed Air foam or add special enhancing chemicals to water so it is more effective fighting the fire so less water is needed. Fighting fires in Rural areas take all types of specialized tactics you do not normally encounter in city's which have plenty of water but when the city firefighters encounter water problems or broken water lines they always know they can get assistance from rural depts tankers to bring them water.
For more information on Dry hydrants check out the following link
http://www.larimer.org/wildfire/dry_hydrant_concept.htm
No comments:
Post a Comment