We all have been at an airport sometime or the other. Flying is fast catching up with railways as a popular means of travel and India is the third biggest aviation market in the world, on its way to become the second biggest! Currently, India has 73 functional airports. Of these, the Kempegowda Airport at Bengaluru is the third busiest airport in India, with 640 air movements (take-offs and landings) and over 90,000 people arriving and departing at the airport. Now, keeping an airport safe is a big task! And airports are one of the places where the risk of a fire breaking out is quite high, with aviation fuel (highly inflammable) stored in the aircrafts and tankers. This calls for every airport to have an efficient and a highly capable fire-fighting team and equipment.
(Other vehicles in the Bengaluru Airport Fire and Safety Department)And this is what brought us to Bengaluru airport in the first place. The Bangalore International Airport Limited (BIAL) invited a handful of journalists to the Bengaluru Airport to witness the airport's fire-fighting team and machines in action. And after seeing the preparedness and the capabilities of the fire-fighting team, it would be safe to say that we were awestruck.
(The Rosenbauer Panther 6x6 can touch a top speed of 120 kmph)Starting with the best and the biggest, the Bengaluru airport has four Rosenbauer 6x6 fire trucks which have been exported from Austria. Out of the four, three are pressed into active service and one is a backup vehicle. In case of an emergency, the response time of these fire trucks, to anywhere within the vicinity of the airport, is just two minutes. Oh! And the specifications of the Panther 6x6 will blow you away!
(It has a 18,000 cc engine which makes 703 bhp)The fire truck uses a Caterpillar engine which displaces 18,000 cc, making 703 bhp. And by no means is it a slouch! The truck does 0-80 kmph in less than 25 seconds and has a top speed of 120 kmph. No mean feat considering the truck weighs 40 tonnes and carries 12,500 litres of water, 1,500 litres of foam and 350 litres of fuel! We did not bother asking the fuel efficiency figures of the truck. We were lucky enough to get a quick spin on the Rosenbauer Panther 6x6 on the runway of the airport as well. It was scary but supremely enjoyable as well!
(The Panther 6x6 has a water capacity of 12,500 litres)The roof turret discharges water at the rate of 6,000 litres per minute while the front bumper turret discharges water at 1,500 litres per minute. Also, the fire truck is fitted with a forward looking infrared camera (FLIR) which helps the fire fighters to look through the dense smoke, fog or rain. The Panther 6x6 is fully capable for off-road operations and gets differential locking as well. The underbody of the fire truck is fully fire resistant and it has spray nozzles for further protection, when driving over burning fuel or a regular fire. No wonder, each of the Rosenbauer Panther 6x6 fire trucks cost over Rs. 5 crore.
(The Mobile Post Command Truck acts as a tactical decision making centre in case of an emergency)Up next is the Mobile Command Post Vehicle or the MCP. Whenever an emergency breaks out, it helps to get as close to the site and have an operations centre which is fully equipped for communications. The MCP is one of the first responders in case of an emergency and helps take tactical command and co-ordination decisions and guide other aircraft fire and rescue teams along with the airport officials and air traffic control. The MCP is fitted with state of the art array of communications equipment such as HD PTZ cameras, wireless radios, heavy duty LED floodlights, auto-tracking mobile DTH TV antenna, a PA system with four speakers and other such equipment as well.
(This is the airport runway friction tester vehicle, based on a Ford Galaxy)One of the most important jobs at the Fire and Safety department at the Bengaluru Airport is that of the Airport Surface Friction Tester vehicle or the ASFT. A Ford Galaxy is fitted with equipment that measures the friction levels on the airport runways and taxiways to ensure that the friction levels are optimum for the take-off and landing of an aircraft.
(Seen here are the Runway Rubber Remover [white] and the Runway Sweeper[yellow])Every time an aircraft lands or takes off, it leaves behind a trail of rubber debris from its tyres. This lowers the friction levels and makes it unsafe for aircrafts to land or take off. This is where the Runway Rubber Removal Equipment comes in. It holds 5,000 litres of water and uses a high-pressure water to remove the rubber debris from the runway or the taxiway. The jet sprays water at a pressure of 2,500 bars at a temperature of 12 degree centigrade. The truck can clean 800 square metres per hour.
(The Runway Sweeper has a magnetic beam which picks up metallic debris)Along with rubber debris, an airport runway also has a lot of other debris which is called Foreign Object Debris or FOD. These could be nuts, bolts, and small aircraft parts and so on. What the runway sweeper does is, collects and scoops all these debris up. It has a magnetic bar upfront, which can pick up all the metal debris and there is a dust-supressing water spray and a vacuum extraction diffuser. The vacuum machine is powered by a 230 bhp auxiliary engine. The sweeper can sweep up to 14,000 square metres in an hour with a hopper capacity of 9.5 cubic metres.
So these were some of the machines that we saw in action and these help to keep the Bengaluru airport safe and operational all the days of the year no matter what the weather is.
