CAIRO — Firefighters in Grady County are due to receive a shipment of new equipment county commissioners say is essential for saving lives.

County commissioners voted unanimously last week to approve a $27,000 purchase of 15 turnout gear sets from the Georgia Fire & Rescue Supply. The county received three bids for the budgeted purchase, with GFRS providing the low bid.

Fire chief Richard Phillips said it can cost around $13,000 to fully outfit a firefighter to enter a burning structure, including turnout, helmets, boots, gloves, hood, face masks and a radio.

“It all adds up,” he said.

Phillips said he’s never turned down a request for updated turnout gear. Instead, he encourages each chief within the Grady County Volunteer Fire Department to replace a handful of the 150 total turnout sets across the department each year to keep prices manageable.

The department also tries to replace gear before it goes out of date, the fire chief said.

By keeping a steady rotation of gear, Phillips said the department is avoiding a scenario where all of its equipment needs to be replaced at once — a requirement he says would crop up once every 10 years.

The proactive measures work to ensure that Grady County is “light years” ahead of where they need to be, Phillips said.

“When I first started we were borrowing stuff from other counties,” he said.

Commissioner LaFaye Copeland, who has tried on the gear, told her fellow commissioners it’s “worth every penny.”

“I don’t even know how they deal with it,” she said. “That’s a heavy uniform.”