JUST three of the county’s retained regular and specialist rescue fire engines have achieved 100 per cent response availability so far this year.

New figures from Hereford & Worcester Fire and Rescue Service (HWFRS) show the extent of station availability in the first quarter of 2014-15.

Retained availability is crucial to the HWFRS case for cutting full-time 24/7 999 cover out of Hereford fire station.

A lack of sufficient crew is the largest reason for unavailability.

Beyond the three appliances on 100 per cent at Ross-on-Wye, Leominster and Bromyard, availability across the county’s retained stations ranges from 61 per cent to 99.8 per cent.

Some stations increased their availability compared to that over the first quarter of in 2013-14, with one Bromyard appliance up 17 per cent.

The appliance at Peterchurch saw its availability drop by six per cent and another at Ledbury nearly six per cent.

In firefighting terms an unavailable appliance is “off the run.” 

A savings plan proposed by HWFRS sees full-time fire and rescue fire cover at Hereford station reduced to a single appliance and no more than seven fire fighters on a shift.

Those seven - presuming all are present - would be the full-time 999 response for the whole county, including the manning of specialist appliances, with Malvern as the nearest full-time back-up.

The specialist options on standby at Hereford are an aerial ladder, an incident response unit, a Land Rover 4x4, an ultra heavy rescue vehicle, a water rescue team and a water rescue vehicle.

Hereford & Worcester Fire and Rescue Authority (HWFRA) accepts that the cuts will compromise response times in the county, but, maintains that, with the retained crews, enough back up is in place.

In June, HWFRA deferred a decision on cutting the cover until a meeting due later this month.

Under the plan, Ledbury could keep its two appliances under deferment while the stations at Leominster, Ross-on-Wye, Bromyard and Whitchurch stay as is.

Cover from the county’s other retained stations is not affected.

Data put to a meeting of HWFRA’s policy and resources committee this week outlined the present extent of retained availability across the county.

The statistics, by station, were:

Ledbury (two appliances)  Appliance 421 - 61 per cent availability (down 5.8 per cent on 2013-14).  Appliance 422 - 99 per cent availability  (down 0.6 per cent).

Fownhope (one appliance) 431 - 93.9 per cent  (down 3.9 per cent)

Ross-on-Wye (two appliances) 441 - 91.9 per cent ( up 5.1 per cent) 442 (100 per cent)

Whitchurch (one appliance) 452 - 87.6 per cent (up 12.6 per cent)

Hereford (one retained appliance) 463 – 95.2 per cent (down 1.4 per cent)

Ewyas Harold (one appliance) 472 - 82.7 per cent (down 1.5 per cent)

Eardisley (one appliance) 481 - 97.8 per cent (down 0.6 per cent)

Kington (one appliance) 492 - 98.1 per cent (down 1 per cent)

Leintwardine (one appliance) 502 - 96.3 per cent (up 1.9 per cent)

Kingsland (one appliance) 511 – 99.8 per cent (down 0.2%)

Leominster (two appliances) 521 - 77.2 per cent (up 2.4 per cent) 522 – 100 per cent
 

Bromyard (two appliances) 541 – 87.2 per cent  (up 17.2 per cent) 542 – 100 per cent

Peterchurch (one appliance) 82.6 per cent (down 6 per cent)

The data shows that, in the case of two appliance retained stations, if there is a deficiency which takes crewing below the two appliance requirement then the regular appliance will  go off the run first so that the rescue appliance remains as available as  possible.

This is the case with Ledbury 421 (see above) where low availability was mainly due to the lack of a sufficiently qualified crew  manager  and suitably qualified breathing apparatus (BA) wearers over the first quarter of the year.

However, the rescue appliance at Ledbury  - 422 -  was still available 99 per cent of the time.

The same equation applies to increases.

At Leominster station, appliance 521 was available 77.2 per cent of the time over the first quarter of 2014-15 – up 2.4  per cent on the first quarter  of 2013-14.

But the low availability over the year so far was mainly due to the lack of sufficient crew and suitably qualified BA wearers.