June 02--MOUNT CARBON -- While making plans to build a new firehouse, Mount Carbon-North Manheim Township Fire Company No. 1, which lost its headquarters to a fire in October, set up temporary shelter in the borough Saturday for its two forest fire all-terrain trucks.
"We were storing one of the trucks in Pottsville and the other in Llewellyn, and we need them here in case we get a call," fire company President Larry Moore said Saturday.
On Saturday, members of the volunteer company rented a 20-by-30-foot tent from Lok-Weld Co., Route 61, Pottsville, and put it up next door to its garage on Main Street that is housing its two fire trucks.
"It will cost us $350 a month to rent the tent. We hope to rent it for six months. We can't keep the trucks out here in wintertime. We'll have to find a place to put them," Moore said.
Early Oct. 4, fire destroyed a vacant home at 118 Main St., which was owned by Tracey E. Craig, Coatesville, Chester County. It also destroyed 116 Main St., home of Linda McElvaney, and 120 Main St., the headquarters of Mount Carbon-North Manheim Township Fire Company No. 1 and the Mount Carbon Borough Council.
Since then, the fire company had been storing the brush trucks at other fire company garages.
"For months, these have been stored out of the area," Moore said.
Both trucks are 1987 model military trucks. Unit 53-70 is "a water rescue truck," and unit 53-40 is a "brush truck," Moore said.
The fire company hired Miller Bros. Construction to build a new firehouse, and Moore anticipates construction will begin in August.
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