Fireboat! Ahoy!

Serendipity! I spent a dinner hour staring out at a fireboat.

This naturally led to speculation about the unfamiliar piece of equipment. Where are the water intakes? How is the water pressurized? What’s its range? How often is it deployed? How fast can it be staffed? Etc., etc., etc.

At the first opportunity, I took a few snapshots of the little red vessel. Visual inspection revealed the following facts: The boat has two monitors, and it has a two standard hose connections and pumper connection.

The back platform is near water level, limiting its capabilities in rough seas. Also, the vessel has shallow draught, appropriate for the waters in which it sails. The vessel is operated by the Humboldt Bay Harbor District. Although the port is a deep water port, the bay is characterized by sandbars and lagoons.

However, simple observation did not answer all of my questions about this interesting boat. Loitering with intent did not achieve that end, either. (And the hubby and I were loitering very effectively. I know this because the operator of a neighboring vessel initiated the type of friendly chat adopted when one is suspicious of a stranger. Thankfully, we were sufficiently middle-class and middle-aged to engender a misguided belief in our good character.)

Incidentally, there are disadvantages to being married to a fellow engineer. A normal spouse will discourage certain behaviors, but a spouse who shares your twisted mindset will think the oddest ideas are sound. In this case, neither of us were able to let our ignorance persist. Driven by curiosity, we hunted down a hapless harbor employee and interrogated him ruthlessly. (Okay, he looked bored and was happy to talk to anyone).

We devoured the few additional snippets of data that this gentleman could provide: The fireboat has only been used occasionally, primarily to support land-based operations. The water stream is taken directly off the turbine propulsion and has a nominal rating of 3,000 US gpm. Since the turbine must be running for the water to flow, the craft can be a little difficult to handle when in use. I bet! Monitor discharge has a range of about 100 ft. The vessel is crewed by a captain and a deckhand, and the local fire department provides a firefighting crew. The output from the the two monitors can be combined into one stream. (I refrained from mentioning why this was not necessarily a good thing. However, I am sure it’s a lot of fun during training.)

By the way, the hubby and I think this kind of thing is part of a romantic getaway. Sigh! We should be featured in a Hallmark movie, should we not?

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