Anchorage Fire Station 9 is fully equipped to supply fire fighters with water. The tank is a 2,500-gallon absolute water carrying machine, but for the foreseeable future it's out of commission.
"It has just reached a point where we cannot reasonably stay within our overtime budget," Fire Chief Chris Bushue said. "We have to make some hard choices on which apparatus to close."
The station's mobile water supply rig is called a tender. Anchorage Firefighters Union officials claim budget shortfalls are the reason for Tender 9 being shutdown.
"They decided to close Tender 9 to try to save some money," said AFD Union President Mike Stumbaugh. "They took $1.2 million out of our budget for a payroll system upgrade."
Union officials say these hard choices could be problematic for Southside residents.
"Really you just have to wait for other resources from parts of the city," Stumbaugh said. "On the hillside you may be waiting quite a while to have your water come."
Currently there are four tenders in serivce in the Municipality of Anchorage. Each of them work together to haul water to help fight fire. For now Anchorage firefighters will have 20 percent less water to help put any fires out in coverage areas.
Contact Garrett Turner: