Fire Fighter (ship)
 The fire fighter
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The Fire Fighter was used as a fire boat for the New York City Fire Department from 1938 to 2012 . During his service time, the fireboat was used in the fire on Normandy , the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 and the crash of US Airways flight 1549 .
Classified as a National Historic Landmark , the ship has been open to the public in Greenport , New York, since its decommissioning as a floating museum .
history
In 1937, the New York City Fire Department (NYFD) had nine fire boats enough to secure the port areas and shipping lanes of the city in peacetime. The increasingly worsening political situation in Europe, however, prompted considerations to increase the fleet further and to be prepared for a possible war. The engineer William Francis Gibbs seized the opportunity to present the city of New York with his ship design for a fireboat that was unique up until then. Although he had previously only gained experience with the construction of passenger and cargo ships, his proposal was able to convince the mayor of the city, Fiorello LaGuardia , who authorized the construction of the ship, which cost around 1,000,000 US dollars.
As early as the end of 1937, the United Shipyards on Staten Island started building the ship under construction number # 856. On August 26, 1938, the ship was launched and the ship was christened . After around three months of testing, the fireboat was officially put into service on November 16, 1938.
After commissioning, the ship was stationed at Pier 1A in Battery Park and assigned to the Marine 1 unit. From here all parts of the Port of New York could be reached, which at that time lay on the coastline of the Hudson and East Rivers of Manhattan and in Brooklyn and Queens . The ship received international attention at the 1939 New York World's Fair due to its design and built-in technology .
The sharp increase in shipping traffic in the city's port also led to increased numbers of fire fighters in the Second World War . The most famous of these operations was the fire in Normandy . In addition, the ship's crew was able to prevent an explosion in the port of Jersey City on April 24, 1943 . Here the El Estero caught fire after around 5,000 tons of ammunition had been taken on board. Together with the fireboat John J. Harvey flooded the Firefighter the El Estero and could permanently delete the fire before the ammunition could explode.
In 1955, the ship's location was relocated to Marine Unit 5 at Gracie Mansion in Manhattan and in 1956 to Marine Unit 8 at Bush Terminal in Brooklyn. The reason for this measure was the steadily increasing container throughput in the port of Brooklyn, which led to a shift in freight traffic in the port of New York. Since the cargo of the ships consisted more and more of containers, the large warehouses for general cargo became more and more superfluous. The owners left them neglected, which led to a steadily increasing number of pier fires. One of the most devastating of these fires was the fire that broke out on December 3, 1956 in a Luckenbach Steamship Co., Inc. warehouse at the Bush Terminal. After the extinguishing work began, several tons of explosives exploded there. Over 200 people were injured and ten were killed. The Fire Fighter , which was also used for the extinguishing work, was badly damaged, but continued the extinguishing work. The then necessary overhaul of the shipyard was used for an extensive technical overhaul.
In 1967 the ship was relocated again. The new place of work was Marine Unit 9 in Stapleton , Staten Island. The reason for this was again a shift in freight traffic away from Brooklyn to States Island. From here, the Fire Fighter moved out on May 31, 1973 for one of its most difficult missions. Forty minutes after midnight, the rudder system on the container ship Sea Witch failed. The now rudderless ship collided with the tanker Esso Brussels and got stuck in it. The leaking oil from the tanker ignited immediately and enveloped both ships in a thick wall of smoke and flames. The crew of the Sea Witch could no longer leave the ship and were trapped in the flames. The Fire Fighter was the first fire boat on site. Due to the thick wall of flames, the crew initially assumed an explosion on the Esso Brussels . Only when the first attempts at extinguishing had an effect did the clouds of smoke reveal the Sea Witch . The pilot on board John T. Cahill used this moment to draw the fireboat's attention to himself with light signals. The crew of the Fire Fighters now used the fire monitors to make their way through the burning oil and walked alongside the Sea Witch to rescue the crew via ladders. Through this maneuver it was possible to save almost all members of the crew alive. For this, the ship received the highest award of the United States Merchant Marine , the Merchant Marine Gallant Ship Citation . To date, no other fireboat has received this award.
After 50 years of service, the ship was added to the National Register of Historic Places in June 1989 . On the same day, it was recognized as a National Historic Landmark. When the John J. Harvey was retired in 1999 , the Fire Fighter was the oldest fireboat in the NYFD's fleet.
In the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 , the NYFD fire boats were among the forces deployed. They were deployed in Battery Park City to provide extinguishing water with their pumps. The collapse of the World Trade Center towers damaged the drinking and extinguishing water network so badly that the ships were the only reliable source of water in the area for the next three weeks.
In 2003 the fireboat was overhauled again, but slowly it became apparent that the ship was technically out of date and plans were made for a replacement. The crash of US Airways Flight 1549 into the Hudson in 2009 was the Fire Fighter's last major deployment . On December 7, 2010, the ship was placed in reserve and replaced by the new Fire Fighter II .
On October 15, 2012 the Fire Fighter was finally taken out of service. She was given to the Fireboat Fire Fighter Museum and can be viewed as a museum ship in Greenport on Long Island . The repair and maintenance of the ship is carried out on a voluntary basis through donations and funds from the National Park Service . A five-month overhaul of the Fire Fighter was completed in April 2017, which also restored the original color scheme.
Extinguishing technology
When it was commissioned, the ship was the most powerful ship in the NYFD's fire fighting fleet, with a pumping speed of 75,000 liters per minute (20,000 gallons per minute). Even today, the performance of the pumps puts many modern fire boats in the shade. The water can be dispensed via various manually operated and adjustable extinguishing monitors for fire fighting or self-protection. In the meantime, experiments were carried out with the delivery of water via a removable tower.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b National Register of Historic Places Registration Form of Fire Fighters (English; PDF , 464 kB), at www.npgallery.nps.gov, accessed on September 19, 2017.
- ↑ The Man behind the Legend , at www.americasfireboat.org, accessed September 19, 2017.
- ↑ 1938–1955: Engine 57, Marine Unit 1 (English), at www.americasfireboat.org, accessed on September 19, 2017.
- ^ Clyde Haberman: Time Ebbs for the Heroes Who Saved the Harbor , New York Times, May 27, 2008, accessed September 19, 2017.
- ↑ 1956–1967: Engine 223, Marine Unit 8 (English), at www.americasfireboat.org, accessed on September 19, 2017.
- ↑ Miracle on 35th Street , at www.marine1fdny.com, accessed September 19, 2017.
- ↑ 1967–2010: Engine 51, Marine Unit 9 (English), www.americasfireboat.org, accessed on September 19, 2017.
- ↑ John Delach: Loss of steering led to fiery collision in New York City's Verrazano Narrows (English), on www.professionalmariner.com On 16 August 2007, accessed on 19 September 2017th
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↑ Fireboat Fire Fighter , at www.museumships.us, accessed September 19, 2017.
Firefighter in the National Register Information System. National Park Service , accessed August 19, 2019. - ↑ Listing of National Historic Landmarks by State: New York. National Park Service , accessed August 19, 2019.
- ↑ Fire Fighter, Fire Boat ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (English), from www.eastendseaport.org, accessed September 19, 2017.
- ^ Alan M. Petrillo: Special Delivery: Two New Fireboats for FDNY , at www.fireapparatusmagazine. On May 1, 2011, accessed on September 19, 2017.
- ↑ Jack Lerch: Apparatus updates (English), at www.nyfd.com, accessed on September 19, 2017.
- ↑ Beth Young: Fire Fighter Returns to Greenport , from www.eastendbeacon.com on June 9, 2017, accessed on September 19, 2017
- ↑ Information about the ship , at www.capecodfd.com, accessed on September 19, 2017.
Coordinates: 41 ° 5 '59.7 " N , 72 ° 21' 33.4" W.