Fire fighters need water - and lots of it.
For thousands of years the Ctesibian pump was commonly used to pump water onto
a fire. Now a PUMPER TRUCK is brought in, carrying a variety of pumps within
it. Typical service requirements for each pump may be 1000 gallons per minute
at a minimum pressure of 120 P.S.I. (pounds per square inch).
Such a pump
might supply seven or eight fire hoses at once, each a thousand feet long.
A turret pipe nozzle such as that shown here can deliver water at upwards of 200
P.S.I.. This is possible because it doesn't have to be held, just aimed, and the
water doesn't need to run through hoses.
Many types of pumps are used for
fire pumper trucks including piston pumps, rotary pumps, and single- and multi-stage
impeller pumps (serial and parallel centrifugal pumps).
(This is a still representation and possibly also a low-resolution
image of a pump which is fully animated in the CD-ROM version of this glossary.)
