Karnes City firefighters are breathing easier after a receiving a $22,300 grant from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Dec. 12.

The grant provides 95 percent of the funding that Karnes City’s rescue unit needs for the purchase of a new breathing-air compressor. The device will allow more air to be compressed into air tanks and will increase the quality of the air that firefighters breathe while on the job.

"Our (current air compressor) won’t even pass air quality standards any more, so we applied for a grant to replace that," Karnes City Fire Chief Charlie Malik said. "It will provide our people with the quality breathing air they need when they’re fighting a fire. This will be a 6,000-pound compressor. That’s what our storage bottles on the rescue truck are, but we’ve never been able to fill them that full because our old compressor only goes to 4,500."

The fire department applied for the grant April this year. It is the first five-figure grant Karnes City has received since 2005.

The Kenedy Fire Department also recently received a grant from the Texas Forest Service, but Kenedy Fire Chief Rudy Saenz told The Countywide that he was too busy to talk about it.