THE WHITE OAK VOLUNTEER Fire Department recently received a surplus four-wheel drive diesel military truck and had it modified to be used to battle wildfires and perform high-water rescues.

WHITE OAK — A brutal wildfire season almost seven years ago motivated the White Oak Volunteer Fire Department to seek an emergency response vehicle. A Texas A&M Forest Service program has helped make that desire a reality.

The department recently finished converting a 1997 four-wheel drive diesel military truck, painting it fire-truck red and white instead of the original camo.

The forest service is among the agencies that receives excess Department of Defense property and then gives them to local fire departments to be turned into emergency vehicles.

White Oak Volunteer Fire Chief Billy McBride said that during the 2011 wildfire season, the city lost three structures because of a lack of manpower and equipment.

“It was Labor Day weekend (in 2011), so everybody was off. Some of the guys that had been in the department and got out just came and said, ‘I’ll help.’ One of our trucks, (or) one of our engines, was operated by one person, and you can’t do that for very long, not in this heat,” he said.

“We had more spot fires than we could put trucks to. The wind was blowing, and it was pushing the fires actually faster. It was sort of like California (wildfires). … Had we had another truck, possibly we could’ve saved maybe one or two more structures,” McBride said.

With a lack of rain amid dry conditions, McBride said East Texas might see “a heavy grass fire season.”

“Normally when we get a truck, (the city of White Oak) will take a truck out of service because it’s being replaced,” he said. “I think we pretty much got them convinced to keep one of our older booster trucks.”

McBride said the vehicle his department received, which has 7,000 miles on the odometer, is similar to those used in Houston during Hurricane Harvey and also can be used for such emergencies as flooding near the Sabine River.

“When we get these spring rains, River Road down here on (Texas) 42, it floods, and we’ll usually have one or two families that may get trapped in their house,” McBride said.

Along with a new paint job for the truck, the department added a back step and a top rack for the fire hose. Mc-Bride said firefighters installed a radio, overhead lights and siren.

The truck is equipped with a 500-gallon tank with foam capability, also referred to as a skid or slip-on unit.

“The skid unit was $20,000. We paid for that ourselves, and then (got reimbursed) through a grant. … We (paid) a little over $6,000 for things that we wanted on it, and we’re probably going to spend a little bit more,” he said. “On the back, we’re going to put some LED lights, where when the firemen are working on a grass fire at night, it’ll be lit up.”

The volunteer department is in a mutual aid system, in which it assists area departments in Gregg County, Mc-Bride said.

“If (Gregg County Sheriff’s Office) happened to get a situation where they’d need the truck, whether it be high water, grass or whatever, all they have to do is … tell us where to go. … It could be in service if we needed it,” he said.