Manteca firefighters delivered some 5,000 pounds of holiday foodstuffs – twice of what they collected last year – to the Second Harvest Food Bank Monday afternoon.

A fire truck and its crew parked in front of the Safeway Store from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. Saturday where they accepted donations from Manteca shoppers.  They credited half of what they delivered as coming from a similar effort at East Union High School.

Fireman Travis Gooch said some of the people didn’t know they were going to be at the market and gave them money instead.  They totaled $170 that they presented to food bank director Mike Mallory.

“Some people coming from the store with baskets would take two bags out of their basket and give us the rest,” he said.

Senior Aiding Fire Efforts (SAFE) volunteers also donated $100 to Turkeys R Us drive and the firefighters union donated $1,000 to the food bank.

The firefighters voiced their support of Safeway Stores in allowing them to park their fire engine in front of their store for six hours on Saturday.