And the Armed Forces in the ‘battle’ of the fire period

A working meeting under Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis in view of this year’s fire season was held at the Ministry of Climate Crisis and Civil Protection.

The Prime Minister was briefed on the preparations and actions taken as a whole with extensive preventive clean-ups and removal of accumulated biomass fuel from sensitive forest ecosystems and the significant increase in ground and air surveillance of dangerous areas, with the aim of preventing both announcement of a possible fire.

It is noted that this year the ground surveillance will increase significantly with the participation of the Armed Forces, especially in the most dangerous areas while the patrols are transformed into purely military, releasing forces of the Fire Brigade and the Greek Police. At the same time, the air patrols will be increased by loaded single-engine aircraft of type Air Tractor and PZL on the days with fire risk index 4 or 5, with the aim of timely announcement of fire and immediate first attack. It is underlined that the air means have been significantly strengthened while a more specialized targeting has been made. At the same time, sponsorships and funding from rescEU have been utilized to increase the available fleet, while the final settlement of the country’s debt to the NSPA service was crucial for the timely leasing of the necessary aircraft.

The Fire Brigade is reinforced with 500 Forest Enterprise Firefighters, who will staff the Special Forest Enterprise Units (EMODE). The total strength of EMODE reaches 590 executives including the 90 specially trained Firefighters. In addition, for the first time this year, our country will host in advance firefighters from six European countries, with the aim of their immediate operational readiness without wasting time for the transfer of forces and the exchange of know-how in the fight against forest fires. The project is funded by the European Commission and will host firefighters from Bulgaria, Romania, Germany, France, Finland, and Norway. The units will be pre-installed in Athens, Larissa and Tripoli.

The cooperation with the Local Government is also upgraded, with the aim of Municipalities and Regions to acquire a key role in the prevention of forest fires. For this purpose, visits are made by the political leadership of the Ministries of Climate Crisis and Civil Protection and Environment and Energy in high risk areas, with the participation of local fire and forestry services as well as Local Government officials. In addition, after institutional intervention, the Municipalities have the ability to immediately carry out cleaning of land in case of negligence of the owner or unknown owner.

In the same context, for the first time, civil protection exercises are designed and implemented with emphasis on organized evacuation in high risk areas with high tourist traffic but also in archaeological sites.

The meeting under the Prime Minister was attended by the Minister of Climate Crisis and Civil Protection, Christos Stylianidis, the Minister of Culture and Sports, Lina Mendoni, the Minister of State, Akis Skertsos, the Deputy Minister of Interior, Lefelos Petsonas, Stelios Ypostas Politsas o Deputy Minister of Climate Crisis and Civil Protection, Evangelos Tournas, o Deputy Minister of Environment, George Amyras, the General Secretary of Coordination, Thanasis Kontogeorgis, the General Secretary of Civil Protection, Vassilis Papageorgiou, the Deputy Secretary General of the General Staff Of Protection, George Marios Karagiannis, the Chief of General Staff, General Konstantinos Floros, the Chief of the Hellenic Police, Lieutenant General Konstantinos Skoumas, the Chief of the Fire Brigade, Lieutenant General Alexios Rapanos, the General Director of the Secretariat of Civil Protection, Foivos Theodorou as well as executives of the Armed Forces, the Security Forces and the Fire Brigade.