https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/17/us/fire-engines-shortage-private-equity.html
As Wall Street Chases Profits, Fire Departments Have Paid the Price
Fire engine manufacturing is now largely controlled by three companies. Around the country, prices have soared, and orders can take years to fulfill.
By Mike BakerMaureen Farrell and Serge F. Kovaleski, The New York Times, Feb. 17, 2025
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For years, the fire truck industry had been ratcheting up prices on new rigs and failing to meet delivery dates of those that were ordered. Some departments have waited years for replacement vehicles while hunting the internet for parts to keep their older rigs going.
Those problems have compounded in recent years as Wall Street executives led an aggressive consolidation of the industry in a plan to boost profits from fire engine sales. One company, backed by a private equity firm, cut its own manufacturing lines as part of a streamlining strategy and then saw a backlog of fire engine orders soar into billions of dollars…
Truck replacement plans have been upended all over the country. … [end quote]
The lack of fire engines will cost lives as wildfires explode all over the country.
Wendy