VESSEL REVIEW | Catamaran response boat delivered to California’s Alameda Fire Department

Vallejo, California-based Lind Marine, through its Moose Boats boatbuilding division, has handed over a new response boat to the Alameda Fire Department (AFD) in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area.

“This purchase was approved by the City of Alameda’s local government due to the vessel’s ability to augment the city’s water supply in the event that the domestic water supply is overwhelmed or crippled by an earthquake,” Ken Royal, Vice President of Sales at Moose Boats, told Baird Maritime. “This vessel and its inherent capabilities of reaching shallow waters and delivering large volumes of water flow will aid other water resources throughout the Bay Area including that in Alameda.”

The AFD catamaran vessel has an LOA of 38.8 feet (11.8 metres), a beam of 13.5 feet (4.11 metres), a draught of 24 inches (0.6 metre), and a displacement of 10.5 tons (9.5 tonnes) at full load. The propulsion arrangement consists of two Cummins QSB6.7 480hp (360kW) diesel engines driving Hamilton HJ29 waterjets via Twin Disc 5075SC gearboxes to deliver a top speed of 38 knots and a range of 280 nautical miles at a cruising speed of 30 knots.

The firefighting equipment includes four monitors connected to two Darley PTO-driven pumps that can be controlled from the helm station. The pump configuration yields up to 5,000 gallons (18,927 litres) per minute of fire-flow out of the four monitors and two large-diameter discharges.

“The challenge lay mainly in designing the system used to govern the powerful drive engines to the fire pumps,” said Royal. “This required electronic ‘black box technology’ integrations used to prevent overpowering the pump capacities.”

The work on the new fireboat nonetheless taught Moose Boats that the company can offer an extremely large capacity fire-flow vessel at a relatively small size in which most personnel can operate without the need for large tonnage licensing.

The boat also has space for eight additional personnel such as divers and rescued survivors besides the four-strong crew. The electronics suite meanwhile includes four Raymarine Axiom 12 multifunction displays with encrypted AIS and FLIR cameras to allow firefighting and rescue operations to be undertaken even in poor visibility. A separate sonar operator/navigator’s station is located behind the helm seat and is to be used in conjunction with dive operations.

“There are also separate compartments designed to house ancillary anchors for dive operations,” Royal said. “There is a davit with interchangeable port and starboard receivers and a rescue board mounted on a swim platform with a quick release pin. This will help facilitate victim recovery from the water without having to commit rescuers into the water themselves.”

Other notable features on the AFD boat include a heated glass windscreen, a Hammond air conditioner, and 13 rigid light bars integrated around the entire exterior of the pilothouse railings and the hull railings for enhanced nighttime illumination.