Any firemans here? I have a question for you.

[Oldcountryboy]

Do the fire truck pump produce enough pressure that you could use them to forcefully clean out road culverts? When I see them in use on t.v. news they seem to be using a lot of force. Well for the last 24 hours we have been having monsoon season around here and while driving around today I noticed that probably 99 percent of all the road culverts were stopped up and causing major road floodings everywhere. I am wondering if a fire truck pump would be strong enough to clean the culverts out. If they could forcefully blow everything out of the culverts then I am gonna write letters to the county commissioner and newspapers to see about getting a firetruck for the county to use.

I just spent a month and a half waiting for the county to fix our dirt road after the last flood. They finally did and less then 24 hours later we start getting torential down pours and the dirt roads are all tore up again. If they would do something about the stopped up culverts they wouldn't have to do so much road repairs. I think it would save a lot of time and money.

[tamsam]

Not seen them used for that,but guess it could be done. If they are full of water it would be a no win deal as they wouldn't get to the clog. That is what I think. Sam

[Quint]

Having been on bridge and culvert detail as a summer job I'd have to say it wouldn't work. It is best to pull the stuff back out the way it came in. Trying to shove it through just makes it pack in worse.

Once during a very heavy rain we had to go out and clear a bridge. This bridge was very low to the creek bed and it always caught a lot of debris. The water was already up to the bridge itself and there was a large jam of brush and logs pushed against the bridge. Water was still flowing under just not too well. So my genius boss (brother in law of some county bigshot) decided he's take the backhoe and shove the stuff under the water so it would flow under the bridge. We told him not to and that we should pull the debris out of the water. Nope he was going to push them down so they'd be carried under the bridge and downstream. Well, he shoved that pile down with the backhoe and it promptly got jammed under the bridge. The water was seriously blocked and the creek began to back up alarmingly fast. It began to spill over the sides of the bridge and began to flood neighboring structures. Caused extensive damage that wouldn't have occurred if he would have just removed the blockage.

[OkieDavid]

Enough pressure- Yes. Would I want to have my hands on the nozzle pointed in the end of the culvert when someone "kicked her in"?......Not a chance. Definately a rookie task and someone had BETTER have a video camera running.

[wildhorse]

You can push up to 500psi although you would probably blow hoses unless you backed it down to around 400psi which should clear most debris.But at that rate you need several men on the hose.

[Darren]

A 2 1/2" attack hose line takes a nozzleman and another fireman behind them to control the line. The pressure runs around 100 to 125 psi. At those pressures a line will whip around if not controlled. You've probably seen a garden hose at 40 psi move around if the water is turned on with out a closed nozzle on the end.

Trying to extend a fire hose line into a long culvert would make it uncontrollable. It might work if the culvert was short enough and the blockage was such that it could be removed without inserting the hose. Whoever's 's on the nozzle is going to get hit by the stuff thrown back.

The highway department may have access to a sewer cleaning truck. Those run 2500 psi. The problem is usually getting one scheduled. Call the highway office with the engineering staff. In WV several counties make up a district. The district office has a maintenance engineer/supervisor. They'll be able to tell you what they can do.

[ericjeeper]

Unless the ditch line on each side of the culvert is lowered.. Otherwise it will just level back out,..
Besides These guys are firefighters not culvert cleaners. Can you imagine your boss telling you that you were going to do something muddy splattery and not in your job forte?
If the county HIGHWAY dept wants to clean the culverts. Lower the ditch elevation on the downhill side and generally the next flooding downpour will flush the culvert back out.

[fordson major]

any fire pump i have seen needs fairly clean water too keep working. much better pump for this app is a manure pump for moving liquid manure, that coupled to a six inch line moves 60,000 plus gallons of liquids per hour. just dig a sump at the low end of the culvert and recirculate the water till the culvert is clean. the line will be difficult to control but it can be done! cheaper than a sewer cleaning truck! and works better as well!

[Common Tator]

Around here, the gutters all drain to the ocean. When major storms with large amounts of rain are predicted they go clean them all out with a broom, rake, whatever it takes. Forcing large amounts of water through would only wash the garbage to the ocean.