Finally a little respite for the firefighters?
"
For the second day in a row, the two fires no longer show formed flame fronts and have not progressed
", announced the Gironde prefecture on Wednesday evening.
Since July 12, 20,800 hectares of forest have gone up in smoke: 7,000 hectares in Teste-de-Buch and 13,800 hectares in the Landiras sector, alone representing a perimeter of 66 km.
Read also“It was played at two minutes”: how the abbey of Frigolet was saved from the flames
Nearly 2,000 firefighters from all over France are mobilized, with six Canadair (capable of carrying approximately 6,000 liters of water) and two Dash (with a carrying capacity of 10,000 liters).
Air resources, however, deemed insufficient by the unions.
Based in Nîmes, the Civil Security air fleet has 12 Canadair, 6 Dash - a 7th will be operational in August, an 8th in 2023 - and 3 Beechcraft, according to Alexandre Jouassard, spokesman for Civil Security who underlines "
the increase in our air fleet resources
”.
A Dash battling the flames in Britain on July 20.
LOIC VENANCE / AFP
Visiting La Teste-de-Buch with the firefighters, Emmanuel Macron announced that he wanted to "
buy more
" firefighting planes.
The 22 planes with which civil protection is equipped were “
sufficient in recent years.
(...) Do we need more?
The answer is yes
”, he judged, stressing that this increased fleet would be European and calling for “
Redeploy an industrial strategy
” to build these devices.
Emmanuel Macron with the firefighters.
POOL / REUTERS
Regarding the situation of the 36,750 people evacuated since July 12, “
all the security conditions for considering (their) return are not yet fulfilled.
The system will be reassessed on a daily basis, and the reintegration of populations will be carried out sector by sector depending on the situation
,” added the prefecture.
Read alsoFire in Gironde: did an elected environmentalist prevent development in the forest of La Teste?
At the same time, two associations of elected officials, the National Federation of Forest Municipalities (FNCOFOR) and the Association of Rural Mayors of France (AMRF), called on Wednesday for “
strong public forest services
”.
They ask "
the State to assume its responsibilities and assume its role of guarantor of the preservation of our forests with a long-term investment and to grant the necessary human resources to elected officials to face all these challenges
" .
, while 500 posts in the National Forestry Office are to be cut.
