GULF SHORES -- It was an exciting week for the Gulf Shores Fire Department.

Not only is the department getting a new station, it’s getting a new truck.

First off, a new bid was opened for the new Fire Station No. 1 to be built this year. Bayshore Construction was the winning bid in the amount of $1.7 million.

Fire Chief Hartly Brokenshaw also said a new firetruck was brought on line the previous week and contained improvements made to the inside by city firefighters.

“We’ve had it now for about three months, but when it came the compartments were just compartments,” Brokenshaw said. “Our guys went in and they customized all the compartments on it. We’ve kind of done a rolling refurb on all our engines to get them all uniform to where they’re a like.”

Firefighters took the bare compartments of the new truck and customized them to fit their needs. And, like Brokenshaw said, they’re eventually going to get all the engines close to the same as possible on the inside.

“I mean these guys, they build racks, they did the welding,” he said. “They did everything and it turned out really good. They are really proud of it, too.”

Brokenshaw said its part of his ongoing efforts to make everyone on his crews especially adept at something.

“I always tell my guys, be an expert at something,” he said. “And if everybody’s an expert, we’ve got 40-something experts out there.”

Brokenshaw recently lost Battalion Chief Mitchell Sims who is the new EMA Director for Baldwin County. Mitchell’s expertise was radio communication, but Brokenshaw believes another firefighter will step up and become the new radio guy for the department.

“With Mitchell leaving you think, ‘oh, we’ve got a big space to fill,’ and we do,” he said. “But I think he’ll admit we’ve got people we can slide right in and never miss a beat.”

Another recent surprise came when the Gulf Shores received a request for information from the Washington, D.C. department.

“A lot of time you find out that people watch what you are doing and we’ve done some netcasts over the internet with the chief of Washington, D.C., and the deputy chief up there,” Brokenshaw said. “The biggest event they had was Obama’s inauguration, that’s the largest event that’s ever happened in D.C.

“They’re talking about that and look at us and go ‘that was just one day. How do y’all handle those events that go one for three and four days?’ I thought they’d be able to tell us about that.”

The request left Brokenshaw proud of his department and his knowledgeable staff.

“You’re kind of speechless,” said.

Some of his firefighters will be going to an international fire chiefs conference in Colorado to put on seminar, also by request.

“We’ve been asked to send people out to do seminars on small-event planning called ‘When Special Events Bring More than Just Your Neighbors,’” he said. We’re really honored to have them going out there for that. I know while they are out there they’ll be talking up Gulf Shores, too.”