NAMPA, Idaho — It's no secret more people are moving to Nampa, and now the fire department has a special truck--called Squad 51--to help alleviate some of those growing pains.
Nampa leaders are getting creative to meet the city's ever growing needs. Squad 51 has been recently implemented at Nampa Fire Station Number One. The idea is to take some of the pressure off of the other vehicles.
"Station Two down south will have two calls at the same time. So they'll be handling one and--so normally Engine One is the downtown hub--so Engine One would normally be responding out. And when Engine One leaves its center hub here, then the fire. So now we don't have an engine that's ready to fight a fire. All of our engines are ready to fight fires is their main objective, so having a squad that's ready to handle medical calls and everything but fires definitely makes everything else better," said Jeff Bowden, a paramedic with the Nampa Fire Department.
Most of the vehicles are manned with three people, but Squad 51 is manned with just two--making it cost efficient. The new truck can get to emergencies, especially medical calls, a little faster than the others. It's even equipped to respond to small brush fires.
"We can jump into any assignment that they give us, or we can break away and handle a medical call in another engine's area. Their main goal is to keep all of the engines in service and ready to fight fires," Bowden said. "We're not going to drive past a grass fire or a car fire. We can actually fix the problems as we come upon them--not just when we're dispatched, when we're at the station."
The goal is to become more efficient and to deliver a better service to the community.
