A FIRE fighters' strike which would have seen the return of army green goddess fire engines on to the streets after an absence of 25 years, is off.

Management has made an 11th hour climbdown from demands which brought the heavily industrialised conurbation of Teesside to the brink of an all out strike by crews.

The result of a ballot expected tomorrow was widely expected to show an overwhelming vote for an all out strike over moves to have Cleveland Fire Brigade share a control room with the police and ambulance service.

Members of the Fire Brigades Union voted for a strike ballot claiming the move would put lives at risk.

Two evacuations of the control room presently shared by Cleveland Police and the Tees, East and North Yorkshire Ambulance Service in one week recently, reinforced their fears.

Cleveland Fire Authority has withdrawn proposals to transfer fire control to the shared control room at Police HQ and will now work with the FBU to test fire control systems.

Authority chairwoman Coun Brenda Forster said: "We have listened to all views on this issue and the overwhelming message to us has been to avoid even the slightest possibility of putting lives at risk because of industrial action. For that reason we decided to take this positive step to end the threat of a strike.

"No one wins in a situation where the safety of our community and the good name of our brigade is put at risk,'' she said.

"What I do want is a positive partnership with the union which will lead is to restored confidence in the brigade's ability to make Teesside a safe place to live and work.''

Executive Drector Ian Hayton said management had taken a positive step to end the "stalemate.'' He said there was no doubt a strike could have cost lives.

FBU branch secretary Alan Blacklee said: "The reason we took action was to protect lives.

"For us the safety of the public is paramount and we are pleased management have had some semblance of common sense.''

The ambulance service is looking into a lost 999 call which is being linked to a woman's death during a recent evacuation of the control room.