Mobile field support trailer

On-site and at-incident servicing and maintenance is becoming the norm for the Equipment & Logistics Service Centre (ELSC) teams. In some locations, however, this can be difficult due to the lack of sufficient space, working area, compressed air, power, or shelter.  

The E&L team therefore started working on a solution – to design and produce a platform that would suit their unique needs and could be taken to incident sites. The Waiharara vegetation fire near Kaimaumau in December 2021/January 2022 gave an extra push to have a solution before the next fire season. Avoiding firefighters bringing equipment back to the logistics base to be worked on, and technicians being able to fly to the area without their heavy and bulky toolboxes became a priority.

After much discussion, the E&L team agreed on a trailer to support their on-site operations. This trailer ticked all the boxes:

• Trailer can be left onsite at a long duration event
• Allows for technicians to be flown in from other regions to assist with staff rotations without having to bring their own tools
• Lower investment costs, both initially and for ongoing maintenance.

Key features include:

• Locker and deck lighting powered either by mains power, or by its own 5.5kva generator
• Integrated awnings to provide shelter from both sun and light rain
• Integral lighting to allow night work (24/7 capability)
• Each trailer has a manually operated crane with synthetic rope, with 150kg lifting capacity allowing the set up and deployment  of the trailer to be completed by 1 person if required.
• The main locker has 240v outlets to run the air compressor and any other small items, along with a built in USB charging port
• Autofit towballs coupling which accepts 50mm & 17/8 couplings
• Secure dry storage for tools, and consumables
• A safe and sturdy work area for equipment maintenance.

Charlie Lott, National Manager E&L is impressed with his team and what they’ve achieved. “I’m proud of Service Centre Managers Josh Dobson and Aubrey Rikihana, who took on the design and build of the trailer based on the lessons we learned from the Waiharara fire.  Essentially they were given a task, assigned the resources and left to get on with it. The result is a fantastic capability enhancement, not only for E&,L but for IMTs involved in long duration or high intensity incidents.”

The aim is to have one in each region, starting with one based in the North Island and one in the South Island for the start of the 2022/2023 fire season. Josh summed up the project, “It gives us the ability to provide maintenance for our equipment on the fire ground. We’re very happy with the finished product and really appreciate the work from Norris Engineering in Te Puke who worked with us and executed our designs”.

Over 2.4m² of usable deck space with recessed anchor points in the deck

 

The inside of the door can be used as a whiteboard

The trailer has duofit style coupling that auto adjusts to accept 1 7/8” and 50mm towballs 2500kg GVM