Loddon
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Address: High Street, Loddon, NR14 6ET Drill Night: Monday Incidents attended: Click here for incident information This is a retained station. It has a crew consisting of one Watch Manager and two Crew Managers and nine Firefighters. |
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If you need a school visit we target these at Year 2 for Key Stage 1, Year 5 for Key Stage 2 and Year 8 for Key Stage 3. If you have someone who is fire-setting and wish to discuss this with one of our advisors please contact us. We are sometimes also able to attend Community events but this will depend on resources, and we tend to target this to priority areas of our service. We do always look forward to hearing from you with any other queries.
Resources
This section contains notes written by the crews of this station.
Loddon is a small town with a population of Around 4000, combined with the village of Chedgrave which joins with Loddon at the river. The station provides cover for a large area, around 40 villages/ parishes. There are eleven firefighters at present.
Loddon Fire Station is located on the High Street in Loddon town centre, this is the main street which runs through the village.The station has one appliance, a Mercedes1122 which carries a wide and varied range of equipment, including extensive Hydraulic Rescue Equipment, used to free persons trapped in vehicles etc. and a Thermal Imaging Camera which was funded by monies raised locally.
Loddon is a retained Fire station, which means that the Firefighters are alerted to an incident "shout" by means of a pocket alerter/pager. (The first pocket alerters, circa 1979, were the size of a paper back book!)
Some of the Loddon crew are self-employed, others work for local companies, being allowed to leave at any time to respond to fire calls. The crew is varied, including engineers, drivers, teachers, divers, full time parents and post office personnel.Therefore, there are a variety of skills which contribute to making an effective team.
The station currently averages around 150 calls a year, including fires, road traffic accidents, animal rescues, flooding, automatic fire alarms and so on. It has been noted that the amount of chimney fires seems to be in decline, whilst the number of road traffic accidents is increasing. In the early years of the current station, the average number of calls was around 80 per year.
History
The current station is the third to be located in the parish. The first station was at the junction of Beccles Road and Norton Road. The old station is now used as a pair of garages, with the old chimney still in place! The old engine was horse drawn, with the horse having to be caught, harnessed and hitched every time there was a shout!
In 1939, the station was moved to a new location, just over the bridge on the border of Loddon and Chedgrave. It was a wooden hut with a tortoise stove for heating and was situated on land owned by Cannell's seed factory.Whilst at Cannell's seeds, there were two vehicles, one a converted lorry which was the water tender and also a Dennis Trailer pump. The engines were sponsored by Norwich Union.
The current station was built in 1956 (Opened 1/12/56) and used to alert the Firefighters to a shout by an old air raid siren situated on top of the metal tower which still stands in the drill yard.The station acquired a new Commer engine in 1960. This was followed by a Bedford in 1970 which had a petrol engine and could seat five in the back.Next came a Dodge in 1980, a Dennis in 1985 and then the current Mercedes in 1990.
How to Find the Station
