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Cullowhee’s new truck is welcome safety addition
It’s been a long time coming, but Cullowhee firefighters at last have the equipment they need to deal with an emergency in Western Carolina University’s high-rise dormitories.
While we can’t help but wonder why it took state officials more than 35 years (WCU’s first nine-story residence hall, Scott, opened in the fall of 1970, and Harrill and Walker soon followed), we’re grateful to Sen. John Snow of Murphy for recognizing the need and seizing the initiative in urging his fellow lawmakers to appropriate the funds for the new platform fire truck.
We also are grateful for the persistence of Cullowhee Fire Chief Richard Frady, who, along with WCU Chancellor John Bardo and Regional Affairs Director Tom McClure, persuaded Snow to introduce the legislation that appropriated more than $700,000 to bring the truck to Jackson County.
As Frady said, we hope the new truck never has to be called into action to rescue students from the upper floors in the event stairwells are blocked by a major fire. However, as both Frady and Bardo said, the presence of the 95-foot platform truck less than a mile from campus provides them with a degree of peace of mind.
We’re sure that the November 2003 fires in Scott provided added impetus to the efforts of fire department and university officials to bring an aerial truck to Cullowhee. Arson attempts on one of the dorm’s middle floors surely were a wake-up call for everyone involved in providing for the safety of students on campus.
The new truck is an asset for the entire county as well as for the Cullowhee area and WCU campus, because the new truck will be available to other fire departments through mutual aid agreements. The fact that it’s a platform rather than a ladder truck will be a huge benefit in any evacuation situation, especially if firefighters are faced with a crisis at Harris Regional Hospital where those trapped would be injured and sick. As one retired firefighter told us, life always comes before property, and people can be helped more efficiently by emergency personnel standing on a platform than those who are forced to try to help others while working from a ladder.
Above all, the new truck offers us another opportunity to realize how much citizens in this county owe the dedicated volunteers of our fire departments and rescue squads. They’re always on call when we need them, and they never let us down.
That’s why we’re so pleased to see state-of-the-art equipment coming their way to help improve safety for both rescue workers and victims.
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