Wednesday, August 26th 2020, 5:59 pm
A local volunteer department that has been helping people for decades now needs some help of its own. The Hickory Hills Volunteer Fire Department in Luther is about to get a lot busier and they need new lifesaving equipment.
The Kickapoo Turnpike is going in just down the road which means they’ll see an increase in accidents and they need better equipment to get people out of wrecks.
Right now, Hickory Hills firefighters use 30-year old jaws of life to pull people from wrecks.
It does the job for wrecks involving cars going 30 to 50 miles per hour. But when the Kickapoo Turnpike opens in the next month connecting Interstate 40 and I-44, call volume for the small department is expected to rise dramatically with cars damaged in 80 to 90 mile per hour crashes.
The hydraulic jaws of life just won’t cut it.
“It’s very time consuming getting it set up. So, it does take five minutes depending on if the generator floods and you have to start it again. Five to 10 minutes that could cost someone possibly their life. Battery operated equipment you can slap a battery in, within 30 seconds to a minute we could be cutting them out,” said Lana Youngblood of the Hickory Hills Fire Department. “The new equipment, it’s a cutter and a spreader and there’s a multi tool and so it has some jaws you can hook on to it that will be able to get us a lot more spread. Our current tool doesn’t do that at all. Basically, it just spreads.”
So, this Friday and Saturday, the department is having a good old fashioned garage sale, hoping to raise a few thousand of the $35,000 needed for the new equipment.
“So right now, we can’t budget in, you know, 34, $35,000 extra for extrication so we decided to do some fundraisers.” Youngblood said.
The department is also hoping to recruit some new volunteers. They said saving lives is its own reward.
“Absolutely,” Youngblood said. “I can’t even tell you what it means for a family member to hug you and tell you thank you.”
If you can’t make the garage sale the department is also asking for donations. Click here to visit their GoFundMe page.
August 26th, 2020
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