Deale VFD Chief Dale Browning shows off some of the new rescue equipment the company was able to purchase with their new ladder truck. The Jaws of Life, shown, allows fire fighters and rescue workers to cut victims out of cars that have been involved in auto accidents. Photo by Mitchelle Stephenson.
The Deale Volunteer Fire Department will host an open house from noon to 5 p.m. Saturday. The event will bring fire protection information, refreshments and dignitaries into the local fire station, but it will also be an opportunity for the community to get a good look at the brand new, $660,000 100-foot ladder truck.
The new truck will also be dedicated at a ceremony. A plaque will be unveiled, and the truck will be dedicated in honor of Tommy Manifold, the former chief of the department for 27 years, and a dedicated fire fighter in Deale for over 54 years, who passed away five years ago.
"There was not a day that he wasn't here, not a tree he didn't trim, not a wall he didn't paint," Deale volunteer firefighter Karen Browning George said about Tommy's legacy at the Deale company.
Other current and past chiefs will also be on hand, including Ray Mudd, Carl Nutwell and Russ Lancaster. In addition, County Executive John R. Leopold, state Sen. Ed Reilly and Del. Bob Costa are also slated to attend.
Dale Browning is Deale's current chief. He said that the Deale firefighters have been working to raise money for their new ladder truck for years. The life span of a fire truck is about 20 years, and the Deale fire station's old ladder truck was a 1991 model.
They received money from the county, through a state grant program, in the amount of $100,000. The remaining $500,000-plus they had to raise themselves through a variety of fundraisers.
One of their main annual fundraisers is Morgue Manor, a haunted house that operates out of an abandoned home near the fire station. The firefighters decorate and "haunt" the house, making each room its own scary encounter.
Each year the house is completely different - they even move the interior walls around. But each year the 45 volunteers who work at the station, and their families and friends, give their best effort to create a creepy experience for the hundreds of visitors who bravely enter.
This year, Morgue Manor opens on Oct. 15, and runs some weeknights and each weekend through Halloween. Dates and times vary, and can be found on the DVFD Web site at www.Deale42.com.
To visit Morgue Manor, visitors arrive at the fire station on Drum Point Road to park. There, they can partake of refreshments while they wait for the red school bus that takes them the short ride to the site of the haunted house. Visitors are dropped off at the end of the driveway, where they take a short walk to the house. Once visitors have paid the $12 to ride the bus and enter the house, they don't get a refund if they are too scared to go in.
This fundraiser, along with others, like cookouts and community events, over several years, allowed them to raise the funds necessary to earn enough money to buy the new truck.
"People might ask why we need a ladder truck in Deale," Chief Browning said, while explaining that the truck is routinely used for rescues.
As part of the new ladder truck acquisition, the fire company received a $50,000 grant from the Department of Homeland Security to buy a variety of rescue equipment, including stabilizing equipment and jacks so that they can right an overturned car. They also got new Jaws of Life tools to be able to cut and spread car metal to get at victims needing to be rescued from auto accidents.
There are other tools too, like the airbags that they deploy to spread iron bars or pry metal apart to do rescues. "We use these, for example if a kid gets his head stuck in metal deck railings," Chief Browning explained.
The new ladder truck, along with the safety and fire prevention trailer, refreshments, smoke machine, fire prevention information and handouts for emergency preparedness will all be available at the open house at 6007 Drum Point Road in Deale.
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