No fire

Today, we brought my technology-interested brother with us to a fire brigade museum. The guide there said that the fire department's color was red already when the fire-fighting vehicles were horse-drawn. I think it's cute with the red padding on the horses' harness.
On the extra image I have a mystery to you. The water buckets  were with a conical bottom. Do you know why? 

ANSWER to the mystery with the water buckets:
The buckets are conical to make them easily cleave the water surface when water was taken from a well or lake. A regular bucket with flat bottom floats on top of the water surface and must be vaulted to allow water to enter. When the bucket drops directly into the water it fills up faster, important when there is a fire!