25,000 acres of wooded forest, thousands of residents evacuated from their homes - including dozens of inmates and staff from Eitanim Mental Health Hospital, thousands of animals killed or injured, damage to homes and farms: This week.
The Fire and Rescue Commissioner, Dedi Simchi, said that this was a fire on the scale of the Carmel disaster, and that the fact that there were no casualties is a great achievement.
But many claim the writing was on the wall, raising a series of difficult questions about the deployment of the fire brigade, the lack of manpower, the skill of the firefighters, the conduct of the fire brigade chiefs and the poor availability of firefighting aircraft.
"In the test of the result, all the billions that the State of Israel has invested in the fire brigade since the Carmel disaster did not materialize," says L., a fire officer from the Jerusalem district who participated in the firefighting efforts this week.
"Aircraft and some new fire engines can not be a tie-breaker against a fire of this magnitude. The manpower of the fire department must be at least twice as large, otherwise we will not be able to overcome such fires quickly and efficiently.
"Management claims there are currently 2,200 operational firefighters. There should be at least 5,000. Repairing the damage caused by these fires is several times the cost of another 2,500 firefighters."
What do you think was wrong with the fire this week?
"On the evening of the first day of the fire, Sunday of the week, the commissioner announced that control of the fire had been achieved even though the weather conditions showed that the incident was far from over. He made an incorrect assessment of the situation.
"At night the fire is calm because there are no winds. But the next morning, I and other elements, including from the squadron, asked to bring up all the planes and not just some of them, but the commissioner refused.
"At noon the weather changed and there were strong winds, and the fire resumed. The forces that were in the area were already exhausted, there were few planes in the air and then they started calling more forces and even talked about international aid.
"When more forces arrived, there was a mess on the ground. Firefighters got lost and accidentally reached Kiryat Ye'arim instead of Givat Ye'arim, and other such mistakes. Miraculously, no disaster happened. , One of the fire department and one of the police, and the rush just kept growing.
"The reason for all this, in my opinion, is a wrong assessment of the situation and a misunderstanding of the weather conditions. An infantryman who arrived a year ago from the army.
"The time has come for such incidents to be investigated by outside professionals, who have no interest in whitewashing things. The investigations they do, as in previous disasters - for example, in fires in the Galilee landscape or in Mevo Modiim - do not reflect reality. Unfortunately, that is probably what they will do here."
A firefighting plane over a forest hill.
"Our planes are limited in the amount of extinguishing material they can carry," Photo: Oren Ben Hakon
• • •
These are not the only allegations of poor cooperation between the fire brigade and the Israel Police.
"On the second day, as the fire raged and residents were evacuated, firefighters and police were unable to decide which unit to sit in," behind-the-scenes firefighters told us. On behalf of it for meetings and situation assessments.
District commanders, the commissioner and the commissioner did not sit down to jointly assess the situation, except at the beginning of the incident, and even then all they were interested in were shooting angles for the media.
"All this caused a complete lack of coordination between the police and the fire brigade. The police said to close the deputies, the fire brigade said to open. The squadron said to pick up planes, the fire brigade resisted.
Other allegations regarding the struggles between the bodies are about the functioning of the firefighting squadron.
The Air Fire Unit of the State of Israel - also called the "Elad Squadron" after the late fire watcher Elad Riven, who perished in the Carmel fire - consists of members of the Israel Police Air Force, members of the National Fire and Rescue Authority, Elbit and Clear Cut. aviation.
This complexity, according to behind-the-scenes firefighting officers, has led to severe ego wars between the police and the fire brigade, which has sometimes created controversy and a delay in the launch of the planes.
"The management of the air force operation is very complex," says Lt. Gen. Tomer Brenner, the squadron commander.
"These are many bodies that need to work together. Sometimes it works smoother, sometimes harder. Sometimes they agree, and sometimes they don't.
"I always try to make decisions in favor of the State of Israel. If we had not acted as we did in this fire, six localities would have been completely burned."
How did you act?
"Our planes are limited in the amount of extinguishing material they can carry, only 3 cubic meters, so they are good for take-off as soon as the fire develops. The fire was reported on Sunday at 3:15 pm by a citizen who reported to the fire department. This procedure, which stems from past lessons, states that in certain areas where the fire engine will take too long to reach, it is possible to take out a plane before the fire engine.
"We immediately launched two planes, and I managed the incident from the control center. I opened the window, saw the cloud of smoke. The report was that the fire ran for ten minutes because of the weather conditions. This means a very complex event, and I immediately sent the rest of the squadron planes. "The planes worked until that evening."
Deputy Superintendent Tomer Brenner, Commander of the Fire Squadron.
"If we had not acted as we did in this fire, six localities would have been burned at all," Photo: Oren Ben Hakon
A senior firefighter claims that the next morning the squadron asked to put up all the firefighting planes, but the fire commissioner thought they were not needed.
"At noon a strong fire broke out, and it was decided to use all the air force in Israel. They also considered assistance from abroad.
On the third day, we stormed the fire as quickly as possible, and we managed to control it. "
Were there things you would have done differently?
"I would do a lot of things differently, but I prefer to interrogate them in front of the operational factors rather than in the media."
Are there plans to increase the squadron so you can better deal with large fires?
"We are in the process of purchasing aircraft with greater capacity. This is a complex matter, depending on the state budget and other things. The order should be sent soon, but even then it will take at least two years for the aircraft to arrive."
• • •
Those who paid the price on the ground are the residents.
Orna and Gershon van Eldrink, both 51 years old, live with Orna's parents and their three grown children on a farm in Givat Ye'arim.
Only recently have they finished building a new house in the farm yard, and they also run a family business there for the construction of musical playgrounds.
"On Sunday afternoon, we received an evacuation order on the locality's WhatsApp," says Orna.
"We and the children went to friends in the nearby Beit Zayit moshav, and we evacuated the parents to my brother - in - law's parents' house, in Jerusalem.
"We were asked to stay out of the seat even at night because of the air pollution. The next afternoon we were instructed to return home. On the way we saw untreated fire pits, but we thought to ourselves they probably know what they are doing.
"After a few hours my husband told me, 'See fire from the porch. We went outside. There was a pungent smell of fire, strong winds, flames like in the movies 20-30 meters from us. We saw the fire approaching east, to the parents' house. I called the fire department, and they They said they were taking care of it.
"All around there was a noise of fire, winds, shattering pine cones. I was hysterical, I was afraid the fire would burn our new home. A burning pine cone was flying into the yard burning weeds right next to our vehicle, and we could not evacuate.
"Only after my 21-year-old son filled a bucket of water and put out the fire that burned near the vehicle could we escape. On leaving the settlement we met the firefighters who arrived. I got out of the vehicle and stopped them. I begged them to save our house."
The damage to the farm of the Van Aldrink family, in Givat Ye'arim,
How long did it take for the fire department to arrive?
"About 20 minutes. In the meantime, part of my parents' house burned down, and our warehouse - with all the equipment and inventory of the business - burned down as a whole. This is damage of at least NIS 150,000. Asbestos that was part of the equipment warehouse also burned, which is very dangerous. Mateh Yehuda transferred us to the Kiryat Anavim Hotel and took care of us. "
• • •
Last month, an investigation was published in "Shishvat" that revealed the failures of dealing with fires in Israel.
Former firefighters, mayors, firefighters, safety experts, residents and volunteers spoke of a severe shortage of manpower and equipment, delays in operating firefighting planes, mistakes in understanding the area and a lack of action plan.
Everyone alike warned: "The question is not whether there will be a disaster, but when."
Again and again we heard the words, "Let them not say afterward that they did not know."
These are the main points of the research.
In early June, three large fires raged in the Jerusalem mountains, apparently as a result of arson.
It took long hours to shut down.
The price was heavy: thousands of acres of grove caught fire, and dozens of residents were evacuated from their homes.
Noam Agmon (71) from Tzur Hadassah saw the smoke in the ridge in front of his house on Friday at 9 a.m., and drove toward the fire, to the security road of the settlement.
"When I arrived, around 9:30, the fire brigade was already there. The fire, on the southern slope of Mount Katron, was small. The firefighters stood on the path next to the fire truck, looked at it and told me, 'We can't get there.'
"I offered them to come from another direction, but for that they needed a 100-meter pipe and they only had a 50-meter pipe. They ordered a firefighting plane, told them a plane would only arrive at 11:30. I asked why it takes two hours, and they said: "Today is Friday, the pilot is on alert from home." They just sat, watched the fire and waited. "
The first firefighting planes arrived at 11:32.
By this time the fire had already gripped large areas.
"A pair of planes was a drop in the ocean," Agmon says.
"More and more planes were launched, and after two hours there was a full air force of 14 planes, fighting the huge fire.
"The fire burned for three days. The pilots carried out a heroic operation to save Tzur Hadassah, but this fire could have been extinguished earlier, with a long fire hose or with planes arriving immediately."
On Thursday, June 10, a week after the first fire in Tzur Hadassah, two more fires broke out in the area.
A fourth fire broke out at five o'clock.
The major fires were handled by firefighters and aircraft.
At the same time, the fire resumed in the fire that remained from the first fire, due to the heat and winds.
"I called the fire brigade around 2 in the afternoon," says Yair Kamirsky, 62, a member of the Tzur Hadassah community committee. "After several attempts, I realized from our CBT that the fire brigade has no fire forces for us, because they are busy with the other fires. I took the security staff and the gardening team of the settlement, we loaded on the back garden sprayers full of water, we reached the fire center on foot and performed a manual extinguishing. From the moment I informed the fire brigade about the fire until we put it out, about two hours passed, during which not a single firefighting team arrived. Until tonight, firefighters did not come and did not contact us. "
Kamirsky believes that a perceptual change is needed in the operation of the fire services.
"Last year we had several large fires, after which residents asked to cut down pine trees in the center of the settlement, on the recommendation of firefighters. The weak points, which cost several tens of thousands of shekels, could have been prevented by the current fire damage, which is estimated at millions and enormous damage to nature. .
Doron (pseudonym), a firefighting officer at the Jerusalem police station, was called to the fires in Tzur Hadassah and Ma'aleh Hamisha at the stage of losing control.
"This fire could have ended in an hour," he says, "there should have been no need for firefighters from across the country to work on it.
"In my district, on a regular basis, an officer who conducts an event and makes an assessment, asks for ten firefighting teams and gets five with difficulty, because there are budget savings and there is a shortage of manpower. We have to beg. "Miraculously, the moshav did not go. They asked for planes and crews and did not receive them, and the fire escaped them."
Why do planes take two hours to arrive?
"The fire department has an agreement with Elbit Systems, the operator of the firefighting squadron, who are paid according to actual working hours and standby hours. Someone gambled and let the pilots be on standby at home and not at the base, to pay less. If the pilot was at the base, he would arrive within 15 minutes."
Shishvat Gate on 02.07.21,
• • •
The Carmel disaster in December 2010 was burned into the public consciousness as a turning point in preparing for fires.
The fire brigade became a national national authority, and the responsibility for it passed from the local authorities to the Ministry of Internal Security.
The Fire and Rescue Commissioner was defined in the law as the highest level of command, with full operational authority.
The Commission has been awarded increased budgets and a glorious firefighting squadron, numbering 14 Air Tractor firefighting aircraft, each containing 3,000 liters of firefighting material.
The planes are stationed in two permanent landing pads: Megiddo in the north and Kedma in the south, and last year they dealt with 200 fires in open areas.
According to data from the Fire and Rescue Commission, since the Carmel disaster, about 300 fire and rescue vehicles have been purchased, adapted to all scenarios.
In addition, in 2014, regulations were drafted in the Knesset regarding the protection of localities from forest fires, but in the absence of budgetary agreements between government ministries, the regulations have not been approved to date.
In 2015, the then State Comptroller, Yosef Shapira, issued a special report on the local authorities' preparedness for fires and weather damage, stating that
"The existing normative infrastructure does not authorize any body to enforce on local authorities compliance with emergency preparedness guidelines, including fires and exceptional weather events. The readiness of each local authority for these situations depends on its willingness to comply with the guidelines given to it and the resources it chooses to allocate. The locals are not prepared and are not properly equipped for fires. "
This year, the comptroller again addressed the issue of fires.
In a report published in June, he describes a difficult situation: "More than 40,000 fires occur in Israel each year, and an average of 100 per day.
126 fire stations scattered throughout the country;
1,641 firefighters and commanders man 72 percent of the operational standard.
1,675 fighters are missing compared to the target set by the authority. "The fire commission presents slightly different data, according to which there are currently 2,200 firefighters and 1,000 staff members.
A report by the Knesset Information and Research Center from September 2017 states that there are 120 fire stations in Israel, but there are 105 more missing in order to reach an optimal response time.
"In the simplest way - there is no money," explains Haim Rokach, head of the Golan Regional Council and head of the security and emergency preparedness department of the Regional Councils Center.
"We are supposed to do firebreaks, deforestation, fire-fighting systems around the settlement, a fire trail, fire stations. It will cost millions.
"I am not ashamed to say that I am afraid. A Technion report submitted in 2012 at the request of the Ministry of the Interior stated that the response time required for a firefighter to arrive is 7 minutes, and the longest time is 15 minutes, but we do not meet any standards.
"There are three fire stations in the Golan: Masada, Katzrin and Bnei Yehuda. In the last two years there have been periods when the fire brigade closed the Bnei Yehuda station due to a shortage of manpower. Even when it operates, it has only two firefighters. 45 minutes, and in practice you can give up - by the time they arrive, everything will have burned down.
"At a meeting last December with the fire commissioner I demanded that they reopen the station. I threatened a strike, and the meeting exploded. In January they really reopened it, but I'm not sure they will not decide to close it again tomorrow."
Yosef Ben Yosef, 52, now CEO of the Yavneel Council, left the fire service a year and a half ago, after 30 years in the service. In his last position, he served as commander of the Tiberias station. He agreed to be interviewed only after many requests, " .
According to him, the Carmel disaster caused a positive shock in the fire department.
"We moved to the Department of Homeland Security, a squadron was formed, a fighter training college was established. I was a partner in a French-trained firefighter training project called Fire Defense Forest, which includes five levels of training for commanders in command and control of open and forest fires. Several groups of fighters, officers and commanders were trained, a computerized combat program and simulator were introduced, and technological adaptations were made to our field conditions.
"In 2017, when the new commissioner, Dedi Simchi, took office, he claimed that this was not the case, and everything was stopped. To this day, there is no other method. Early preparation: Prepare scenarios and courses of action, do not be reactive and rely on luck.
"Worse, the number of people recruited at the headquarters is disproportionate to the number of fighters. The state comptroller also noted that there were too many staff members and too few firefighters. The new commissioner was uncomfortable with the workers' organization, and he chose to fight him. "Between the command level and the operational level. When the fighters do not believe in the commander, they will not do what they know best to do - put out the fire."
Yuval (pseudonym) is a station commander in the center of the country.
In his opinion, too, the failure lies in the incorrect management of the workforce.
“At my station, and at other stations as well, they stopped giving firefighters overtime, even on extreme weather days, when the crews needed to be reinforced.
“A standard of the U.S. National Fire Department (which serves as a professional guiding factor for firefighters around the world) states that one firefighter should be treated per 1,000 residents.
By this standard I need 400 firefighters, but I have 100. That means I work well below the red line, which is the minimum operational line.
If a fire develops I send crews, and remain exposed in his area I am responsible.
In addition, when there are no overtime hours, what does it do for the firefighter? The fighting spirit on the floor. The firefighters were then under sanctions, and the commissioner punished them and did not call them so as not to give them overtime.
"When the fire spread, forces were launched from Be'er Sheva and Petah Tikva, while firefighters from my station asked to come and help voluntarily. Only six hours after the fire started they were called. There was heavy damage: houses, vegetation, infrastructure, cars were burned - anything a fire could take."
• • •
Another report of the auditor in 2015 includes a series of guidelines for localities: training of buffer lines and a perimeter access road; maintenance of access roads to localities and the main roads within them; There are fire hydrants that are up to 100 meters apart, the establishment of a warehouse for fire-fighting equipment in each locality and more.
"The State Comptroller's Office believes that in view of the danger of fire posed to localities near or within forests, the Ministry of Internal Security and the Ministry of the Interior, in cooperation with the Ministry of Finance, the Local Government Center and Regional Councils, must act as soon as possible to approve localities." The report reads. "Any delay in training protective envelopes for protected localities and sections of protected roads and in setting up fire-fighting equipment warehouses in protected localities could cost human lives and property damage."
Alon Bitton, today the head of the local government center and until a year and a half ago the head of Mevo Modiim, who experienced firsthand the great and traumatic fire in the locality, believes that the solution is one responsible body. The overarching goal is to approve and budget a master plan for preparedness for fires, especially in buffer lines, define security rings, decide what types of trees can be planted within the locality, and make a national priority of the localities according to the degree of risk.
"After the fire in the Galilee landscape, we piloted the construction of buffer lines according to the guidelines. I hope it will enter practical lines. Without a budget, this is nonsense. No authority can afford these expenses. I hope the necessary budgets will be found in the new Knesset."
• • •
"After the Carmel disaster, we built buffer lines in the connection between the forests and the adjacent settlements in more than 400 sections, 30,000 dunams," says Gilad Ostrovsky, chief forester and director of the JNF's forestry division.
"In some places we also set up buffer lines inside the forest, to prevent the fire from spreading and to allow access to fire and rescue vehicles. We also brought Bedouin shepherds from the south with pastures, so that they would eliminate the weeds that could become flammable material.
"We have 24 fire engines of our own, operated by JNF employees.
From May 1, the beginning of the fire season, there are drives that are observed in the forest to detect fires quickly.
We are also building a program for all the forests, which combines research on the behavior of fire in different places. "
But why is there no ban on burning, and no enforcement?
"On days when there are fire warnings from the Meteorological Service, we issue public notices forbidding lighting fires in the forest. We have inspectors roaming, but these are large areas and we have no authority to give reports.
We are working on the 'Forest Law', which will authorize us to distribute fines.
I hope we can pass it in the current Knesset. "
• • •
"What I have improved in 4 years has not improved here in 40 years," said Fire and Rescue Commissioner, Major Dedi Simchi, in response to an investigation we published in July.
"We intensified with 500 firefighters, 80 of them from the Arab sector, and in addition, we recruited Arab civilians for civilian service, as combat supporters.
"I set up a department, a research and development department, part of the work of which is chemical additives to water, which make water extinguishing more efficient. A year ago I put robots on life-threatening missions, and soon we will be piloting skimmers, UAVs and ground cameras, locating and locating fires in real time.
"הטייסת שלנו פועלת על פי תפיסה מבצעית, רק בעונת הקיץ, ונותנת מענה לשריפות על פי מדרג: הצלת חיים, בתים, ואחר כך טבע. במצבים של אינדקס שריפות גבוה אנחנו מעלים מטוסים לאוויר כדי לאתר שריפות לפני שהן מתפשטות. באזורים מועדים לפורענות אנחנו מקפיצים מטוס לפני הכבאית.
"תקציב הכיבוי עומד על 1.4 מיליארד שקלים בשנה, מתוכם תקציב הטייסת עומד על 70 מיליון, ואני צריך לכלכל את המשאבים האלה. יש מגבלה של שעות טיסה. בהערכת מצב בודקים אם נשקפת סכנה ליישוב, ואם יש צורך בטייסת במקומות אחרים. אני חייב לעמוד במבחן עלות־תועלת, ניהול סיכונים לאומי".
• • •
מהרשות הארצית לכבאות והצלה נמסר: "אין בכוונתנו להתייחס לטענות שווא הנסמכות על רכילות זולה, במקרה הטוב, מטעמם של גורמים אינטרסנטיים המונעים משיקולים שלהם, ולהתפתחות הכבאות בשנים האחרונות אין כל קשר. מדובר בניסיונות חוזרים ונשנים לפגוע בסגל הפיקוד הבכיר בכבאות, במפקדים ובלוחמי האש, תוך התעלמות מכוונת מהמציאות ומהעובדות בשטח".
ממשטרת ישראל לא התקבלה תגובה.
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