Fire Engines Photos

French body for a German city. The GTLF10000 is a DIN specification for a city heavy tanker. On a highly maneuverable 6X2 rear steer chassis, this is not primarily intended to be deployed to support brush units, but to tackle industrial and commercial fires in locations where the scale of a potential incident may outweigh the water supplies immediately available from nearby hydrants.

The water tank holds 10,000 litres and these are usually well equipped with foam for industrial firefighting; they are also typically amongst the first responding units to commercial vehicle fires, especially on Autobahns - where hydrants are not always available.

Germany is still a country with a very large number of very large industrial companies and factories , including chemicals and refineries. As a result, many city fire services have units like this, even though they often have very large and superbly equipped industrial and works fire brigades at various locations within their municipalities.

Added by Rob Johnson on 16 January 2023.

Normally German FD are not very keen on purchasing equipment from other countries, however the EU markets offers are changing the habits sometimes.

Ed: I have never understood EU open procurement rules. They were designed to prevent corruption esp from the mafia. How do France and Germany protect their domestic markets when the whole point is that it is a common market and there should be no problem with a French bodybuilder tendering for a contract in Germany and vice versa. How do they stop them in practice?(I am pro EU!)

Added by PETER JACQUES on 18 January 2023.

Petros: I may be wrong but I think a lot of it is simply tradition. If you have historically bought brand X and are happy with their performance and maintenance costs then it makes sense to buy the same brand again.

Added by Rob Johnson on 18 January 2023.

A good example of the open procurement system working is the fact that the Italian VdF has purchased large numbers of units on Mercedes, MAN and Volvo chassis in recent years, although the bodywork is mainly still by Italian BAE. This is in contrast to earlier purchases, which were all FIAT and IVECO. It is noticeable that Scania is also making inroads in recent years with quite a few German and French fire services too, although there still seems to be a strong preference for locally based bodies.

Added by Rob Johnson on 27 August 2023.

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