Navigating the narrow and winding streets of the Eastside’s hilly neighborhoods pose a special challenge for fire fighters speeding to a brush or house fire. That is why the declaration of a Red Flag alert on a hot and windy day would require all vehicles be moved off streets with posted signs (no such warning was in effect this morning in the City of Los Angeles). How much clearance does a fire truck need? Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Shawn Lenske said many of the city’s main fire fighting engines – called” tripples” – are about seven feet wide. The department’s newest KME model engines (pictured above) are about eight-feet wide, according to a company spokesman. The engines are part of a large and diverse group of trucks found in the department’s fleet, which ranges from relatively small, brush patrol vehicles to heavy duty aerial-ladder trucks that can deploy 100-foot long ladders.”They can make it through all our city roads,” Lenske said. “We get as close as we possibly can and then we will bring our resources, whether we have to carry it or have to fly it in.”
Photo from LAFD website
I think they LAFD should have kept one or two Seagraves for the LA hills. There are streets the new trucks can not get pass where the Seagraves could.