"They had to truck it from Wilmington Island to Tybee to put water in the parking lot to put it on my building," recalls Joel Solomon, owner of Café Loco.
Solomon watched that building go up in smoke in November, 2006. Reconstruction kept Café Loco closed for six months.
"The firefighters did a great job. I don't think they could have done anything better except have more water on hand," explains Solomon.
"Some of the areas we have that don't have hydrants or anything, and you get there with a thousand gallons and you still have a lot of fire - now you've got a problem," says Tybee Island Fire Chief C.L. Sasser.
But a new tanker pumper truck is providing a solution.
It drops 2000 gallons in 45 seconds!
A portable drop tank, removed from straps and put on the ground, provides the water crews need.
"It's not just a truck because of its capability of carrying 2000 gallons of water, and the fact it's a pumper also. You can actually use this as a piece of apparatus at a fire scene. Say for unforseen circumstances a pumper did go down, you can slide this one into place, connect the hoses and keep on going!" explains Sasser.
The 163-thousand dollar vehicle was bought with SPLOST revenues.
A purchase Tybee Island's Mayor says - should make neighbors here and around Chatham County feel safer.
"Spanish Hammock, Lazaretto Creek, even up to Fort Pulaski and the Coast Guard Station - all don't have hydrants. Even though those aren't parts of the City of Tybee, some of them pay a special service fee to us and we feel obligated to help provide them a better fire service," says Mayor Jason Buelterman.
"We still don't have water plugs down here. So that's definitely going to be a big help if anything else happens," adds Solomon.
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