Rethinking Traditions - When Fire Engines Changed Colours

For decades, bright red was synonymous with the fire brigade. From hose carts to motor engines, fire engines have carried the same red paint as they sped to incidents and the rescue of others. Interest in reducing the impact and severity of fire and emergencies through the decreased response times saw permanent change to the traditional livery that decorated fire engines for over a century.

FirePacs in their new test livery outside City of Sydney Fire Station, 1996 [Museum of Fire Collection]

A trial introduced in 1996 aimed to reduce the response times and in turn, the impact of fire and emergency incidents on the community by increasing the conspicuity of fire appliances. It was thought that a more visible and eye-catching vehicle would reduce the amount of time taken by crews to arrive at the scene of an incident. The faster response time would therefore correlate to lower levels of property damage, injuries and even possible fatalities resulting from emergency incidents. The increase in the conspicuity did not refer only to the colour of the fire engine’s body, but the total package of the elements that go together to make the vehicle. The trial had to take a number of elements into account, from the shape, colour, movement, silhouette and movement of the vehicle, but also how road conditions such as daytime, night and weather conditions affected how they were perceived.

FirePac with the trial all-white livery outside Blacktown Fire Station [Museum of Fire Collection]

A total of four appliances were included in the trial, a FirePac Hazmat vehicle, and three FirePac Fire and Rescue vehicles, each with a different bodywork colour: lime-yellow, all- white, all-red, and red and white. While distinctive during the day, the traditionally used red tended to be perceived as black in low light conditions and was therefore less visible at night. In addition to alterations to the colour of the vehicles, the design of the reflective tape striping was updated to increase its effectiveness. Unlike light globes which produced their own light, the tape borrowed light and bounced it back to the original source, making it effective from a number of different angles and intensities.  The striping was placed in three different locations on the body of the vehicle; at a low-level to provide eye level awareness for standard sedan or station wagon drivers, centre level for pedestrians and other road users in a higher position than standard domestic vehicles, and around the cabin, with the arrow-shaped outline creating an instantly visible signifier of the direction in which the vehicle was moving. Further alterations to the designs saw the installation of blue strobe lights in addition to the traditional red warning beacons.

FirePac with the trial lime-yellow livery, July 1996 [Museum of Fire Collection]

Each vehicle was installed on three-month rotation at Blacktown, Liverpool, and Burwood, busy, primary rescue accredited fire stations. Over many months, the vehicles were evaluated under operational conditions to determine the effect that vehicle appearance had on response time in different visual environments and traffic conditions. After several months of testing and feedback from firefighters, it was determined that the blue warning beacons were noticed by drivers before the body colour. As red was already strongly linked to fire engines in the public mind, the trial vehicles were eventually repainted red and white, whilst retaining the blue lights and new reflective striping.

~ Story by Museum of Fire Heritage Team