Detroit Fire Department gets 5 more new engines

DETROIT (WJBK) - The city of Detroit got five more new fire engines Friday morning. They're the last of 10 new rigs hitting the streets.

The rigs come with a pricetag of just over $5 million, and the funds come from the city's general fund. It's not the last of the money, though. There's still $9 million in the funds allocated to the fire department. The use for that money will be decided in the coming months.

Meanwhile, the five newest trucks will be hitting the departments on Lawndale, Manistique, Houston, Whittier, and Ryan roads.

"We're running on average right now 45 companies. We have 14 ladder trucks; we have approximately six squads running, another 26 engines running. We've got 10 new engines in our fleet. We have a few older bumpers that are between 10-15 years old, and next year at this time we hope to replace them with 10 more rigs," says Jenkins. "All these bumpers are going into the neighborhoods; we've got them peppered in the east side and the west side. So, this is great. This is going to promote our reliability."

The chassies are also made right here in Michigan at Spartan Motor, Inc. in Charlotte, which is about 25 miles southwest of Lansing.

"Spartan is really to be part of the resurgance of Detorit and the comeback," says CEO Daryl Adams.

Each engine is equipped with eight airbags a piece, so they're shiny and bright and safer than ever.