Fire Engines Photos

These 8000 liter Steyr tankers, and many others on Renault chassis, were issued by the Belgian Interior Minsitry to fire brigades all over the country.

Their purpose was to supply water at structure fires in urban areas, where hydrants were either too widely spaced or too limited in flow to be deemed adequate to be the sole water source.

Although they could of course be used at rural and vegetation fires, this was not their prinicipal role - hence the absence of four wheel drive.

The big tank was feasible because at that time Belgium allowed a two axle truck to weigh up to 19 tons gross. This unit had a 320 BHP engine, so it was quite fast enough even at is full laden weight.

These have of course all been replaced by now, very often by 12, 000 liter tankers on tandem axle chassis.

Added by Rob Johnson on 22 April 2019.

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