A fire appliance with a ladder in action at the Loafers Lodge fire in Wellington last week. Photo: RNZ / Denise Garland
Fire and Emergency says it has yet to order big new ladder trucks and has yet to confirm when the bulk of smaller fire trucks will be delivered.
FENZ will receive funding of $25 million per year for the next three years to upgrade what it has admitted is an "ageing" fleet with an average age of 25 years.
It is buying five big trucks before it has finalised a long-awaited 30-year strategy to gauge just what it needs and where.
This was "because we are certain these appliances are required", it said.
However, it has been unable to order the large ladder trucks, worth around $10m, because it was still working to finally confirm the contract to make sure the investment was "as protected as possible", it said.
For the smaller trucks, called Type 3s, which do not have built-in ladders, FENZ has three new ones on trial, and expects to get two more within a month.
However, it said it has yet to confirm it will get another 20 by the end of next year.
It has about 200 of these in the fleet already but a large chunk of them are 20 or 30 years old or older.
Chassis cracks and defects sidelined some new ones it bought a few years ago.
FENZ says all Type 3s with cracks have been repaired and none are out of service with cracks.