Fireboat
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A fireboat is a specialized watercraft, often resembling a tugboat, with pumps and nozzels designed for fighting shoreline and shipboard fires. They are particularly useful for fighting fires on docks and shoreside warehouses as they can directly attack fires in the supporting underpinnings of these structures. As they also have an unlimited supply of water available, pumping directly from the harbor and can be used to assist shore based firefighters when other water is in low supply or is unavailable, for example, due to earthquake breakage of water mains, as happened in San Francisco due to the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake.
Modern fireboats are capable of pumping tens of thousands of gallons of water per minute. The most technologically advanced of these is Fire Boat #2 of the Los Angeles Fire Department, Warner Lawrence, with the capability to pump up to 38,000 gallons per minute and up to 400 feet in the air.
Fireboats are most usually seen by the public when welcoming a fleet or historical ships with a display of their water moving capabilities, throwing large arcs of water in every direction.
See also
External links
- Los Angeles Fire Department Fireboats (http://www.lafire.com/fire_boats/the_boats.htm)
- Former NYFD Fireboat John J. Harvey (http://www.fireboat.org/)
- San Francisco Fire Department Fireboats (http://www.sffiremuseum.org/fireboats.html)de:Löschboot