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Fire chief lays out equipment, staffing and hydrant priorities for Mesilla
Summary
Mesilla’s fire chief presented a multi-part plan to modernize the department — from new SCBAs and training to hydrant repairs and regional auto-aid — and warned modern building materials make faster, more toxic fires that require updated tactics and equipment.
The Mesilla fire chief told the Board of Trustees that firefighting in town has changed and that the department must modernize to keep residents and firefighters safe. The chief said the department now has four paid staff and a larger volunteer base, and projected about 2,000 calls this year as call volumes have risen sharply.
“The first three missions… we are taught as firefighters as our mission objectives. We are after life safety first,” the chief said, describing departmental priorities. He detailed that an Insurance Service Office (ISO) rating affects both state funding and residents’ insurance costs and set a goal of improving Mesilla’s ISO score from a Class 4 toward a Class 2.
The chief emphasized equipment and training needs tied to modern fire behavior. “This is why we are changing our equipment. We're changing our gear. We're changing our hoses. We're changing our nozzles,” he told trustees, citing research from the UL Fire Safety Research Institute showing faster flashover and more toxic smoke in rooms filled with modern plastics and foams. He said that modern burns can become unsurvivable for firefighters in minutes and that up-to-date tactics and equipment are essential.
On breathing apparatus, the chief gave a concrete plan: the department has been phasing replacement of self-contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) packs and aims for one pack per seat on each apparatus. He reported 17 new packs on hand and described a multi-year purchase plan and county donations that together should get the department to roughly the one-pack-per-seat target once bottles and masks arrive.
Trustees and members of the public asked detailed follow-ups about hydrants, mutual aid, staffing and training costs. The chief said Mesilla is working with county and neighboring agencies on automatic aid so the closest units are dispatched together, improving first-arrival capability and safety for larger incidents.
