Professionals in the fight against forest fires worry about the approach of the summer season: in the midst of deconfinement, the number of volunteers could decrease among the firefighters, and the vigilance of the population slacken.
Monitoring and fighting fires that devour an average of 9,300 hectares of forest each year around the Mediterranean requires (s) a massive mobilization of human and material resources as well as an adapted and vigilant behavior of the population as a whole
, underline this Monday, April 27, the firefighters of Bouches-du-Rhône in a press release.
Gold, volunteer firefighters may be less available due to increased paid or liberal activity during the summer to compensate for the loss of activity in the spring
, they explain.
Fear of “loosening”
Added to this fear is that of a loosening
Population following the confinement
, which could favor fires, while some of the essential activities
related to firefighters’ preparation for the fire season has been postponed.
Already, the Bouches-du-Rhône firefighters indicate that they resumed some training and checks on firefighting equipment last Monday.
The firefighters of Var, another department on the front line facing fires, said share this questioning
, and wait impatiently
details of the deconfinement plan to prepare for the season.
On the biggest summer days, up to 1,200 firefighters are mobilized per day
in the Var, between monitoring the beaches, the teams pre-positioned against forest fires or holding barracks, continued one of their spokesmen.
Will there be enough volunteers this summer? This are primarily employees of the private or public, they have a job and when they have an availability, they are volunteers
, recalls André Goretti, one of the leaders of the Autonomous Federation of Professional Firefighters.
In a department like Alpes-Maritimes, where this unionist works, the concern is that routine interventions
, which had become scarce with containment, add to the risk of forest fires, which require an appropriate additional workforce, and a resurgence of the pandemic
.
The question of means
In this context, the crowds on the beaches or in the mountains, a possible influx of tourists in the South if holidays abroad are impossible are all factors watched by professionals, who have already struggled, before the start of the season
fires, against several fires, in Corsica in February or mid-April near Bordeaux.
In terms of air fight resources, some pilot training had to be postponed but everything has been rescheduled with one goal: to be ready for the start of the season
, declares the spokesperson of the civil security, Michaël Bernier.
We will have to remind people to be vigilant: it is not because we are going to deconfinate that we must forget all the rules for preventing forest fires
, which a cigarette butt thrown in the wild or the spark of a gardening machine can trigger, he adds.
But union side, Stephan Le Bars, pilot representative (SNPNAC) deplores that there was, according to him, less training than in other years
, because of containment.
He is especially worried about the availability of air assets, between obsolete aircraft, which have not yet been replaced, and those which are in maintenance.
Not only can we fear that there will not be enough resources on the ground this year, but we will not be able to support them as we would like because we will not have the means
adequate air, he feared.
– .
