Retired from firefighting, John Hazzlewood now volunteers with the Tasmanian Fire Service Museum, helping to maintain and restore the state’s fire trucks and vehicles from times gone by.“We have vehicles literally all over the place, including this one, a 1955 Dennis fire truck that has been sitting up at Saint Mary’s where we have been working on it, and we are now taking it in to Launceston,” says Hazzlewood, from the town of Bicheno on Tassie’s east coast. Big Rigs caught up with him during a break at Caltex, Epping Forest. He was driving a 2016 Fire Service Fuso, with the old Dennis on the back.
“As you can see, it has spent most of its life in Launceston, though in the mid 70s it went to work out of Westbury, and so now I am taking it back up to Launceston again.
Hazzlewood served as a firefighter for 38 great years. When he retired, he decided to volunteer for the museum and says he is really enjoying being part of preserving some of the sector’s history.
“We have vehicles all over the place in all sorts of conditions, and our priority is in restoring and maintaining them,” he says. “That keeps me pretty occupied, but when I do take a bit of time off I enjoy mucking around with bits and pieces, but mainly I like to go fishing.”