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City Donates Breathing Gear to Hernando Beach Volunteers
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Published: December 23, 2007
NEW PORT RICHEY, Fla. - NEW PORT RICHEY, Fla. - Tis' the season for gift giving and spreading holiday cheer, so the New Port Richey Fire Department is doing just that.
Last week, City Council members approved the donation of surplus self-contained breathing apparatus to the Hernando Beach Volunteer Fire Department.
Firefighters wear the apparatus, known as SCBA, while fighting fires or in other areas in which toxic substances might be in the air.
According to Hernando Beach Fire Chief Steve Knowlton, the 26 MSA air packs his firefighters have been using are "really old and out of date."
The New Port Richey Fire Department has two dozen of the SCBA units it no longer needs and is giving them to the volunteer fire company in the Spring Hill area.
The SCBA has three major components, a high-pressure tank, a pressure regulator and face mask. The trio of components is connected together and mounted on a carrying frame.
Replacement SCBA units would cost $4,000 each, Knowlton says. The total cost to replace all 26 would be $104,000.
That would be a lot of money for the Hernando fire unit. It gets its funding from a yearly $66 assessment on each household in the coastal area west of U.S. 19.
Not having to make that expenditure will be a good thing for his department's budget for the next several years, Knowlton said.
The New Port Richey Fire Department is replacing the 24 SCBAs it is sending to Hernando Beach using money it secured from the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program in 2002 and 2003.
"We still had very good equipment here and rather than see it go to a landfill... it's good to have it go to another fire department that can actually use the equipment," said New Port Richey Fire Chief Dan Azzariti.
The FEMA grant helps firefighters and other first responders obtain critically needed equipment, protective gear, emergency vehicles, training, and other resources needed to protect the public and emergency personnel from fire and related hazards, according to the FEMA Web site.
Fire departments routinely exchange equipment and other items they need, Azzariti explained.
"We try to help each other," Knowlton says of the team effort. "Whatever we can do for each other, that's how we work."
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