Hours of great fear, ash and smoke in the uncontaminated landscape between Perd'e Sali and Spagnolu, a devastated forest, "precisely that slice of territory in which we had invested time and resources to increase planting", sighs the mayor Angelo Dessì.
This is the toll of the fire that started yesterday in the Sarroch countryside. The flames, extinguished only at dusk, broke out in the morning when a 78-year-old from Villa San Pietro, reported for negligent arson, lost control of the fire set to burn branches after pruning some olive trees. "To think that it all started from nonsense makes you even more angry", underlines the mayor.
The fire went out of control in a few minutes due to the strong mistral.
Houses evacuated, animals escaped or moved from farms. Several fire brigade teams, the Forestry Corps, volunteers and two Canadairs intervened on site, but they were unable to operate due to strong gusts of wind.
FEW HELICOPTERS
And as the fire season begins, there are only 5 helicopters available in Sardinia out of the 14 requested by the Forestry Corps.
Of the five lots for the fire service, lot 3 was awarded, for three helicopters for the bases of Anela, Farcana and Pula it was assigned to the Salerno company "E+S Air", while lot 5 for two vehicles at the Villasalto base it was won by the Piedmontese “Eliossola”.
The other three lots were snubbed by the airlines. Now the Presidency of the Region is trying to take action with an urgent procedure, published on Tuesday, to cover the three-year period from 2024 to 2026. This new procedure will probably not be successful either, by now the helicopters, but above all the pilots, are already " placed” in other regions or in other nations that have allocated more funds for the aerial fight against the fires.
All the details in the articles by Federico Cogoni and Andrea Artizzu on L'Unione Sarda on newsstands and in the digital edition
abbonati.unionesarda.it/Edicola