24/3/2006 - Pump action in Kendal

A state-of-the-art, high-volume water pump that was crucial during the clean-up operation in last year’s Cumbrian floods is to be given a permanent home in the county.

The media are invited to a demonstration of the pump’s staggering ability to transfer 7,000 litres of water per minute. The demonstration will take place on Tuesday March 28th at 2pm at K Shoes Warehouse on Natland Rd in Kendal, where the pump will suck water from the River Kent, transfer it round the car park and shoot it back into the river in a 100-ft arc.

During the January floods, the pump had to be driven up to Carlisle from the Fire Service College in Gloucester. Its first task was to pump out the flooded Willow Holme electricity substation, enabling power to be restored to local pumping houses in a ‘domino effect’ that sped up the city’s return to normality.

The high-volume pump can also be used for conventional firefighting. It was deployed during the Buncefield oil depot explosion just before Christmas. And when two fires broke out simultaneously at Cannock Chase in Staffordshire last summer, it was deployed to pump water to both sites, helping to bring the situation under control within just four hours.

The pump, which has a hose attachment that runs to just under two miles in length, will be permanently based in Kendal and will have a specially trained crew of five firefighters to operate it. It will be part of the UK's civil resilience programme and may be deployed around the country.

The equipment was developed as part of the Government’s New Dimension programme, a £200 million nationwide drive pioneered by the ODPM which was brought in after 9/11 to equip and train the fire and rescue service to provide the best possible response to major incidents.

“Cumbria’s floods have been described as a 1-in-250 year event, and everyone hopes nothing like it will happen again. But the addition of this equipment to Cumbria Fire & Rescue’s armoury means we’ll be better prepared if it does,” said Councillor Geoff Hodgson, cabinet spokesman for Cumbria Fire & Rescue. 

“It will also be crucial in extreme fires when huge volumes of water are needed in a short space of time,” he said.