Crime & Safety

Hopatcong Fire Truck Wows at Parade

Company No. 3's antique brush truck earns two first-place awards.

Two weeks or hard work paid off for the Hopatcong fire department.

Several Company No. 3 volunteers dedicated hours and hours to touching up a 30-year-old fire truck. The result? Two first-place trophies at Sussex County's fire department parade on Saturday in Franklin.

Hopatcong grabbed the top prize in the antique brush truck and restored antique categories. Fire Chief Mike Rahill said Company No. 3 engineer Shawn Pond and others led the restortion effort.

Find out what's happening in Hopatcong-Spartawith free, real-time updates from Patch.

"They just did an outstanding job over the last month rebuilding it," Rahill said. "It was a good team effort. We had a good time up there."

Pond credited several Company No. 3 volunteers with the win, including William Steger, John Wilkerson, Kenneth Worflar and Rick Allen.

Find out what's happening in Hopatcong-Spartawith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Rahill said a first-due pumper truck from Company No. 4 also competed. He said Rob Tallaksen led that effort. "That [truck] looked equally great," Rahill said.

The brush truck—No. 152—is still active, Rahill said. Pond said the truck didn't win any awards last year due to a judging miscommunication, but took home first-place prizes the two previous years.

"We had to repaint some stuff," Pond said. "A lot of cleaning. A lot of polishing. ... Every year it gets a little bit easier. We didn't do anteing different. Same thing we do every year."

Pond said the truck featured several eye-catching elements—chrome indian tanks and a chrome water gun from a FDNY boat, and a portable pump from the World War 2 era.


Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

To request removal of your name from an arrest report, submit these required items to arrestreports@patch.com.