ORANGE BEACH, Ala. — Firefighting crews have a pair of new toys to train with and soon employ in battling fires and responding to medical emergencies.

The Sutphen trucks arrived on Sunday and the crews are currently training on how to use the equipment on them. Officials hope to have them in full service in 30 days.

Dray Resmondo, who was promoted to captain on Tuesday, was responsible for ordering the trucks and seeing through the delivery and training. The City Council approved almost $700,000 in August for the new trucks.

“We are super excited as a department,” Resmondo said. “We talked about it today, we never, as far as the department here, bought two trucks so that both of our main stations, Station 2 on Canal Road and this station right here, as far as a first-out EMS and fire apparatus, they’ll both be the same. We’ve never done that before.”

Resmondo said each Sutphen Guardian pumper can carry 750 gallons of water, is capable of pumping 1,500 gallons of water a minute and can hold a six-man crew.

“They are also equipped with foam capabilities,” Resmondo said. “They have an onboard 30-gallon foam tank.”

The identical trucks will serve many functions for the department and citizens.

“They are an excellent fire-fighting apparatus as well as an ACLS, advanced cardiac life support equipped for our city and our department,” Resmondo said. “We’ll carry everything on there as far as all our EMS equipment and gear with personnel as well as the fire-fighting equipment.”

The hybrid trucks have to serve a multitude of tasks because of the city’s size.

“We need that good in-between because we may fight a fire and the next call could be a medical call,” he said. “At the same time, we could change gears and go on a water rescue call where our guys will be forced to go in the Gulf and swim.”

Before the trucks can be placed into service, equipment for all these tasks must be stocked into the cabinets lining both sides of the truck.

“It’s just because we have to carry so much in 2013,” Resmondo said. “One compartment, in the past would have fire gear on it. Now our fire trucks have EMS equipment, vehicle extraction equipment as well as fire-fighting gear, water rescue and then high-rise fires, we have specific high-rise equipment. We just carry a lot of stuff.”

And these trucks were ordered with that in mind.

“That was one of the things when we set out to purchase the trucks was to optimize space and put a lot of storage because we just carry so many different tools,” he said. “Those trucks have the roll-up doors and compartments all the way around.

“On our older trucks the ladders are stored on the side. These have the ladders actually through the rear of the truck in a compartment all its own so you have storage all the way around the truck.”

Crews spent the first part of the week training with a company representative and will continue to train and load the trucks to get them ready for “first-out” service. The current “first-out” truck is a 2000 model.

“A lot of stuff has changed in 10 years,” Resmondo said. “There’s a world of difference in operating and inspecting and maintaining that truck as compared to our old truck. Then the process starts where we start mounting all our equipment on it, transfer some things over and get them put in.

“Our goal is 30 days after this week. We had to order some different equipment and stuff and it will take a little more time because we want them both to be the same, the same equipment. That’s just going to take a little time to get done, but we’re hoping for 30 days.”

Before coming to Orange Beach, and after his arrival, Resmondo said he was a volunteer fire fighter and helped buy several trucks.

“I was involved in a lot of the purchases as far as fire trucks for that department,” he said. “And doing that I was exposed to a lot of the different manufacturers and I got to experience working from a budget.”

The newly promoted captain said he got the task of ordering the trucks and following through from a conservation he had with new Chief Shane Phillips when he came on board in August of 2011.

“When we first met I told him that was one of the things I had a passion for was working with the fire truck industry,” he said. “It makes it better when they come to work and are excited and happy they are getting something that’s functional and they’ve got plenty of room and it’s safe.”

Resmondo said Phillips was very supportive during the process.

“He’ll set your parameters and he’ll give you advice, but he doesn’t get involved,” he said. “He does, but he doesn’t. He’ll offer you advice and steer you in a direction. He knows that these guys are the ones out here working on the trucks, they’re the ones that have to make it work and live with it a third of your life. He wanted that process to be right.”