Fire Department Gets New Wheels

Westport Fire Chief Christopher Ackley who serves as chairman of the 14-municipality Fairfield County Hazardous Materials Unit announced today the acquisition of a 2010 F-350 pick-up tow vehicle.

It will be utilized to tow a regional firefighting foam trailer housed at the Fairfield Fire Department Headquarters located on Reef Road. The $40,000 vehicle was purchased with federal grant monies secured by Chief Ackley, according to a news release.

The regional foam trailer which was allocated to Fairfield County Haz Mat by the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection has been assigned to the Town of Fairfield Fire Department since its arrival five years ago.  The foam response trailer — one of five in the state — most recently used at a methanol tanker accident in Fairfield on Interstate 95 in early November.

Richard Felner, chief of the Fairfield Fire Department said in the release that "this new addition to the regional Haz Mat team fleet will make it easier and safer for his firefighters to tow the foam trailer to incident, and improve the overall operational outcome at emergency scenes as we have witnessed over the past several months.

The Fairfield County Hazardous Materials Unit began in the early 1980s and was the first formally organized hazardous materials response team in the State of Connecticut. It is based at Westport Fire Headquarters.