Repair Shop

Repair Shop
14850 Winchester Boulevard
Los Gatos, CA 95030

Built: 1980

The maintenance facilities are located behind Winchester Station 5. Shown here with Engine 6 and a Reserve Truck 111 awaiting service.

Santa Clara County Fire Dept Archive

An early photo of the facilities. Date unknown.

Shop interior. At the time this photo was taken, 14 Jan 2003, the shop was working on final outfitting of the new Truck 5, conversion of Engine 11 (shown) to Reserve Engine 110, and maintenance on battalion 3.

Pickup 1 at the training tower.

Why are fire engines red?

Three ride in the front, four ride in the rear¹;
Three times four is twelve;
There are twelve inches in a ruler;
Queen Mary was a ruler;
Queen Mary was also a ship;
Ships sail on the sea;
Fish swim in the sea;
Fish have fins;
the Finns fought the Russians²;
Russians are Red³;
Fire engines are always rushin';
And that's why fire engines are red⁴!

OK, to avoid needless feedback reporting the obvious inaccuracies, it should be stated that this riddle goes back at least 50 years, and
¹ Nowadays, it's only 3-4 crew per engine, and firefighters are forbidden from riding in back for safety reasons;
² see: World War II;
³ until 1989;
⁴ ...except when they're not, like in this department.

photos: Captain Mike Sanders

Sometimes, things break down, even on fire engines. Here, Engine 13 gets a tow for repairs. It takes a big tow truck to haul a fire engine. August 2002.

Historic photos of the Maintenance Division, Repair Shop and staff can be seen on the Maintenance Division Historical page.