Although the city of Lubbock is working on upgrades for Fire Stations 1 and 11, they can cross Fire Station 18 off the to-do list.
The Lubbock Fire Department unveiled the new station Monday, located at 6611 Oakridge Avenue. Fire Chief Mike Kemp said they strive to keep their response times under four minutes, so it's important to have strategically-placed locations throughout the city. Although they respond to any call, this station will serve a different purpose than others.
"This particular station is a single-engine station," Kemp said. "We respond to structure response out of it. But we also have a reserve apparatus out here. We have several pieces of reserve apparatus, and as we add stations and add equipment, we've had to actually increase the fleet of reserves. All those reserves are, if a piece of apparatus goes down, we have one in backup."
The station will also hold a truck that will respond to wildfires across the state.
