A new one for me

[MIKEYLIKESIT]

Has anyone ever had this happen ? I was driving our 1996 Lance Rescue Pumper on a "smell of gas" run and heard a strange sound. As we were making our way to the scene, the low voltage warning started to sound. As we arrived, dispatch advised that we were "dragging something" behind the engine and it was sparking. I shut the rig down and as we looked behind the engine, lo and behold, our FUEL TANK had fallen and diesel was pouring out of it. One of the straps holding the tank in place had failed and we now had a haz mat incident. We were able to dyke the area but we lost over 50 gallons of fuel. You could actually see the trail all the way up to the scene. I have never had anything like this happen before, and I dont seem to recall hearing of anyone else having this occur. How about the peanut gallery? Anyone?

[Moose2028]

on our 1988 E-One tanker we lost one of the straps but were able to weld it back on before it could fall all the way off.

[Dalmatian90]

Yikes!

Worse we ever did was have a drive shaft fall off the rear U-joint on an ambulance going to a call. Road Rescue took responsibility for that one.

[RedBank24]

Not quite the same, but we had a puncture hole in the gasoline tank for one of our old tankers. Before we noticed what was going on, lost 75 gallons of unleaded down the bay drain.

[TCFire]

My City's Fire Department lost a fuel tank off one of their American Eagle pumpers semi-recently. Believe it was due to corrosion on one of the straps.

[DeputyChiefGonzo]

We had that happen on a three alarm fire... our 1974 Maxim dropped its fuel tank while pumping a master stream!!!! Corrosion of the straps holding the fuel tank was the problem.

[AFD368]

Just reading your post (without reading the other responses),I had my response all set to go;

I have never had anything like this happen before,

and I dont seem to recall hearing of anyone else having this occur.

I have not heard of this happening before either. It's just not an everyday occurance.

Well, by the responses prior to mine, I guess it happens more than I realized. It's got to scare the hell out of you (the driver) when it happens during a response. Shouldn't this particular incident be something that would be found during an annual truck inspection? Not specificly just the DOT inspection, but a complete visual inspection, by Department personnel?
I hope everything went well at both incidents. This one could have been worse than it was.

[len1582]

It's happened in my dept a few times, the last time was about a week or two ago....as Forrest Gump said "It happens"

[mcaldwell]

I have never heard of a fuel tank dropping out until now. One of our neighboring depts (Banff, Alberta) had the bottom of the water tank drop out of one of thier old engines many years back. That was good for a laugh afterwards, but that fuel tank would be a little scary. I guess they were lucky they didn't get many sparks from the dragging tank, or it would have made for a nice light show behind the engine.

[Weruj1]

Never heard of it happening on a fire truck ............but my first car was the family car hand-me-down it happened to me pulling into the station parking lot answering a call .........didnt loose any fuel though, oh ya .........coroded straps was my issuse also.

[CollegeBuff]

Transporting a mostly-stable respiratory distress patient to the ER.

"BANG!" seeming to come from the left side of the truck while taking a sharp highway turn. Nothing obvious in the mirrors, tech says nothing loose in the back. "Must've driven over a closed soda bottle or something."

Hmm.... truck's driving awful rough, but I've never driven this truck before this run.... it's an old Navy ambulance... maybe it's just the way it rides......

YEAH. Right.

As it turns out, the left rear inside tire BLEW THE TREAD.

That was the bang.

Why was it riding so rough?

When the tread came loose it whipped around at, uh, the speed I was going, struck the mudflap at the point at which it fastens to the truck, and BENT it up and OVER the tires, with the bottom edge of teh flap facing the cab!!!

[CALFFBOU]

Mikey- Sounds like you had a failure in the
"flux-capacitor."

Serioulsy...Sounds like a warranty problem???

[stillPSFB]

Worst I've ever had was when the tailshaft of our tanker let go at the front end and dug into the ground at 55mph - major pucker factor!

[jsdobson]

Happened to me a few years ago. Was driving an older Chevy pickup that we used for a brush fire, initial response vehicle. Had just cleared an intersection when there was a bang and an awful sound of metal draging on the pavement. Lost a little gas that evaporated before we could get absorbent pads from the fire station 3 blocks away. Another case of the straps failing.

[hwoods]

Doo Doo Happens. We have had driveshafts (4), fuel tank (1), Generators (2), and a Compartment Floor (!!) fall/break/fail on our apparatus over the years. No injuries, No Damage, other than the equipment involved. Never happened here, but some other P.G. Companies have had broken axles on Seagrave apparatus. Some of the 70's/early 80s 'Graves seemed to have wooden axles...... Stay Safe....

[mcleoud151]

Was driving down the local freeway (I-5) after another car fire, when the engineer said the engine was driving "funny". People were starting to wave to us as they passed too....that in itself isn't unusual, but the smoke coming from the back of the engine was! We took the next exit, and pulled off the road. The engineer and I jumped out, to find our axle at about a 45 degree rotation to the truck. Just another adventure with our old '84 Western Mistakes. Golly I miss that rig!

[fallujahff]

2 weeks before we retired it, our tanker lost it's entire exhaust system and was held on by only one strap--
Quite a sight to have the tanker dragging the exhaust pipe and muffler throwing a huge rooster tail of sparks!

[MIKEYLIKESIT]

Thanks for your replies. The engine is still sitting in the bay, out of service. The rig just went in for PM this fall. I am not sure why this wasn't noticed. Pierce has been notified of this too. I am sure that a 7 year old Engine,in good condition and serviced regularly dosen't have this happen very often. The original call was a "nothing". I would hate to see what would have happend if it was a fire or something serious. We were saved some embarrassment, because the "final resting ground" was on a very un-busy street. We had a four man crew plus a Chief and we had some diking material on-board to keep the product out of the sewers until heavy-duty emulsifier was applied. The tank is being repaired as I type this, but it is odd seeing a 300k+ Rescue Engine up on cribbing, rear end facing the bay door.

[enginehouse2]

"TANK" goodness no one was hurt. we've dropped driveshafts in the bays. equipment rolled out of compartments. And one embarressing time for me was a rear door was open and all twelve spare scba tanks left a trail for the PD to find me to return them. The worst we had was firefighter some how drove to the scene with the engine in pump and roll setting leaving chunks of our pump on the road. never lost a fuel tank but i'll check the straps in the morning.

[ncffemt]

Never lost a gas tank but did loose a 35' ladder .... Turned corner and drug it about 3 miles to a dry hydrant during a house fire.. A resident in the neighborhood took a picture of it ..... Needless to say had to replace ladder.....