Fire-float

Fire-floats

When ships loaded with valuable cargoes are berthed together in crowded docks surrounded by warehouses, a fire can be disastrous. Although land-based fire-engines are able to reach much of the fire ground, waterborne fire-engines, or fire-floats, can fight the fire from the water.

The first recorded^{[citation needed]} fire-float was built in 1765 for the Sun Fire Insurance Company in London. This was a manual pump in a small boat, rowed by its crew to the scene of the fire. A similar craft was built in Bristol by James Hillhouse for the Imperial Fire Insurance Office in the 1780s. All fire fighting in Bristol was carried out either by private insurance companies or the Docks Company until the formation of the Bristol Fire Brigade as a branch of the police in 1876. By the middle of the nineteenth centaury, self-propelled steam-fire-floats were beginning to be introduced. The first to appear in Bristol was the Fire Queen, built by Shand Mason & Co., London, in 1884 for service in the City Docks. The 53 ft. (16.61 m.) long craft was equipped with a three-cylinder steam-pump supplying two large hose reels; one of these was replaced with a monitor, or water-cannon, in 1900. Fire Queen served until 1922.

See also

• Fireboat