Wilkes-Barre Fire Dept. reaches for the sky with new $1.2 million ladder truck

WILKES-BARRE — The name of the new ladder truck dedicated Tuesday by the Wilkes-Barre City Fire Department wasn’t the only long thing about it.

The effort to get the 2020 Pierce Enforcer 107-foot Ascendant Tractor Drawn Aerial Ladder funded, designed and built took a while too.

“This journey started about five years ago when we were starting to have some operational, technical difficulties with our current aerial ladder that is parked a bit down the street,” Fire Chief Jay Delaney said at the start of the program outside the Hollenback Fire Station where the new truck was parked.

It’s been difficult to get parts to repair the old ladder truck, purchased in 2003, and the technology is outdated: Delaney detailed the problems associated with the apparatus that will be used as a backup. It’s been out of service for a total of 182 days over the past four years, one day longer than the 181-page manual put together by the committee of firefighters that had input into the $1,188,335 tractor drawn aerial made to the department’s specifications.

With city struggling to stay afloat financially, coming up with the money to pay for the new ladder truck was a challenge.

Delaney said the city asked non-profits organizations for help. “We didn’t do good, nothing,” he said of the request for funds.

The city through Joyce Morrash Zaykowski of its Office of Community Development and its former head, Kurt Sauer, got the ball rolling. State Rep. Eddie Day Pashinski, D-Wilkes-Barre, and state Sen. John Yudichak, I-Swoyersville, came through with the remaining $420,000 in the form of a Local Share Account program state grant from revenues from the Mohegan Sun Pocono casino in Plains Township.

“Not a penny of the money came from our general fund budget to pay for this,” added Mayor George Brown. He promised that future LSA grant applications would focus on requests for the city.

While giving credit to all involved in the project, Delaney mentioned the tractor drawn aerial committee members by name: Capt. Robert Smith, Capt. Chris Buchanan, Capt. Francis Evanko, Capt. William Court, Pvt. George Liebman, Pvt. George Lehman, Pvt. John Kirn, Pvt. Don Sosik, Pvt. Dave Gutowski, Pvt. Chris Smith and Deputy Fire Chief Alan Klapat.

Delaney also sat on the committee, which was formed in January 2019. The truck was ordered in September 2019 and delivered last week.

“So these projects don’t happen overnight,” Delaney said.

The truck itself won’t be put into service until another two or three months so the firefighters can be trained to operate it. A team of them underwent 40 hours of training the trainer sessions over from last Thursday to Sunday by two firefighters from Seattle, Washington.

“The main thing with this ladder truck over anything else I will discuss today is maneuverability, maneuverability,” Delaney said.

The truck has a tiller in the rear where a driver sits and steers. It’s also designed with extensive storage compartments for equipment, has a faster setup time and outfitted with state-of-the-art technology. There’s a camera at the end of the ladder and the water nozzle at the tip can be controlled remotely so a firefighter does not have to be perched atop it.

“And the ladder that’s on this is 107 feet high. That I believe is probably the highest ladder in Luzerne County at least, maybe Northeastern Pennsylvania,” Delaney said.

“The residents in the high-rises should feel much safer with this piece of equipment,” Brown said.

Following a practice with new trucks and engines, Deacon Donald Crane, a former Wilkes-Barre police officer, blessed the vehicle with holy water.