All Fired Up

Picture a fire engine in your mind. Now let me guess the colour. Since the establishment of Sydney’s fire and rescue service in 1884, we have become accustomed to standard, royal red fire engines. But don’t you think it would be far more interesting to see a variety of colours, as pioneered by other countries around the world?

In the USA, Nielsen’s Fire Protection in Palmdale, California have operated light blue fire trucks since 1996, and in 2014 Nest Products purchased a blue fire truck to tour the USA in promotion of their latest product-a carbon monoxide smoke alarm. Meanwhile in Barberton, Ohio, purple fire engines match the local school’s colours. And last year in Merseyside, England, pink fire engines were branded with cancer awareness messages in support of an Action On Cancer campaign.

A 2009 study by the U.S. Fire Administration found that fluorescent orange and lime green fire engines (as found in Palm Beach Garden Fire Department, Florida) are the most noticeable. It’s because the colour transmitting cones in our eyes are more receptive to brighter, luminous colours, especially at night-time when low lighting makes duller colours such as red more difficult to register.

In 1995 optometrist Stephen S. solomon and researcher James G.King published a study based on data from the Dallas Fire Department, comparing red and lime green coloured fire engines.

They suggested that red engines are three times more susceptible to visibility-related, multiple-vehicle accidents, and that when lime coloured vehicles were involved in an accident, injury or tow away damage was less likely.

An earlier study by Solomon, sampling 750000 fire vehicles trips across nine cities, discovered that lime coloured fire engines were only half as likely as their red counterparts to be involved in accidents at intersections.

So, fire engines are not always painted red as we are conditioned to expect. Many variants around the world bust that stereo type with their immaginative designs, and perhaps Sydney could benefit from brightly coloured fire engines as well. Aside from possibly reducing collisions, a fluorescent pink engine would certainly look the part as it hurtles down Oxford St. Or if we’re feeling patriotic, how about green and gold?

Trivia: Fire engines are not always painted red as we are conditioned to expect. Many variants around the world bust that stereotype with their imaginative designs, and perhaps sydney could benefit from brightly coloured fire engines as well.