Roger Mardon fire service history

Fire service historian and author

Roger Mardon

www.romar.org.uk

The former Auxiliary Fire Service (AFS) emergency pump, popularly known as the Green Goddess, has come to the end of the road. The 2002/03 firefighters’ strike saw these familiar old appliances providing emergency cover to the British public for the last time. On that occasion 827 (including 156 reserves) were deployed around the country with military crews from all three armed services. They were supported by 331 Breathing Apparatus Rescue Teams (BARTs) and 59 Rescue Equipment Support Teams (RESTs) using light trucks with blue lights and emergency markings. Both categories of rescue team comprised professional Royal Air Force and Royal Navy firefighters supported by other specially trained military personnel.

Public confidence in the 50-year old Green Goddesses was stretched and they were supplemented by 177 Red Goddesses, the colloquial name for those more modern fire engines made available by some fire brigades before they were sold out of service. The Government decided that the old AFS appliances should not be used again and they were offered for sale. Approximately 1,000 remained in Government store at the beginning of 2005 and in February 2005 the first of a number of sales took place with a view to disposing of the entire stock. However there was plainly a need to maintain contingency plans for any possible future industrial action in the fire service and for major terrorist incidents.

Therefore exactly what has replaced the Green Goddesses?

The New Dimension programme was established to deal with the terrorist threat. Specialist vehicles have been built and stationed around the country to deal with mass decontamination, high volume pumping, urban search and rescue, and command and control. These new appliances can be deployed anywhere in the country and they are also available for civil disasters, such as serious flooding or building collapse. High volume pumping units were used to relieve the floods in Carlisle in February 2005, where previously Green Goddesses would have been brought in.

New legislation enabled the Government to require fire brigades to make fire engines and equipment available for use by military personnel in the event of another firefighters’ strike. This resulted in a new strategy and no longer would there be entirely separate rescue teams. Some Red Goddess crews, to continue with the colloquialism, would be amalgamated with the BART and REST personnel to form a rescue engine able to provide a first response to an incident, undertake snatch rescues and use cutting equipment. The crew of a rescue engine would comprise one professional firefighter, two members trained in the use of breathing apparatus (BA) and three members with basic firefighting skills.

Three hundred rescue engines across the country would be supplemented by forty road traffic accident engines (RTAEs) and four hundred support engines (SEs). The RTAEs would be able to deal with vehicle crashes as well general firefighting and would be crewed by three personnel with BA skills and three with basic skills. The SEs would have a crew of four with basic skills only and be able to deal with smaller fires and general firefighting.

That contingency plan provided for 740 vehicles as opposed to 1,061 active vehicles under the former arrangements. However, the rescue engines would have been able to operate in their full role without the need for essential specialist back-up.

Since the country's commitment to the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, the military has said it is no longer able to provide personnel to cover in the event of another firefighters' strike. Responsibility now rests with each individual fire authority to make its own contingency plans.