More than 600 firefighters from several departments are mobilized to fight this rapidly progressing fire. Three other departments are affected by the fires: Charente, Drôme and Maine-et-Loire. In Gironde, the gigantic fire of Landiras in July resumes.
About 3,000 campers and residents of two villages in Aveyron had to be evacuated on Tuesday as a precaution due to a fire which ravaged 700 hectares of vegetation, but which stopped progressing without being brought under control. The evolution of the fire remained uncertain due to the wind. Part of the fire, located on rock bars, was still inaccessible to firefighters.
“We are a few kilometers from the fire but we evacuated because of the toxic fumes”, told AFP the manager of the campsite of the inn in Mostuéjouls, Nicolas Bouviala, whose 200 customers were put on preventive shelter. “The prefecture called and said: ‘we have to start evacuating the campsite slowly’. Half an hour later, there was no one left,” he explained. “The flames were a few hundred meters away, the gendarmes and the firefighters came to tell us to evacuate, we all had to leave in the middle of the night”, testifies Gabin Castro, manager of guest rooms, worried about his accommodation, treehouses.
Tuesday at the end of the day, the prefecture of Aveyron warned that the evacuees could not return to their homes or to their holiday accommodation. The authorities have ordered the evacuation of the entire hilltop village of Mostuéjouls, located below the Causse de Sauveterre, in the Tarn gorges, not far from the coniferous forest in the grip of flames, in the heart of the Grands Causses Regional Natural Park. This park is part of a larger area, the Causses and Cévennes, listed as World Heritage by Unesco.
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The firefighters, up to 600 at the height of the mobilization, estimate that they will need another three days to put out the fire. Two of them were slightly injured. Civil Security supported the efforts of the firefighters with bulldozers, in order to constitute firewalls, and two water bomber helicopters, making it possible to carry out more precise drops than planes. The people evacuated as a preventive measure from Mostuéjouls but also from the village of Rivière-sur-Tarn were directed to village halls and schools in neighboring municipalities and Millau.
The fire started on the Sauveterre plateau because of an agricultural machine whose metallic element scraped the very hot tar of the road, causing sparks. In a context of great drought, part of a departmental road near Massegros, 60 kilometers east of Rodez, caught fire, according to firefighters. The farmer driving the tractor himself called for help, before using water from his tank to fight the flames, and calling several farmers to help. Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin is expected on Wednesday at the scene of the fire.
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150 hectares destroyed in Charente
Several outbreaks of fire were noted along the RD32 (Lozère) and the RD9 (Aveyron), in particular at a place called Bombes, in Aveyron. On June 18 and 19, 35 km from Mostuéjouls, another fire in Comprégnac (Aveyron) had covered 430 hectares of forest, without causing any victims. Dozens of people had been evacuated as a precaution.
Lozère and Aveyron are not the only departments affected by the fires on Tuesday. In Charente, a fire started on Monday evening and still “in developmenton Tuesday morning destroyed 150 hectares of forest in southern Charente, the prefecture announced. At 8 a.m. Tuesday,nearly 150 hectares of forest were destroyed and nearly 30 people were evacuated“Said the prefecture in a situation report released by press release.
More than 220 firefighters are mobilized to put out this fire.in development” in the town of Boisbreteau, bordering Charente-Maritime, and “air assets – water bomber helicopter and Canadair – are expected“As reinforcement in the morning, added the prefecture. About 200 homes were without electricity after two high-voltage lines were cut by Enedis, the network manager, according to the same source.
180 hectares burned and 3 firefighters injured in the Drôme
The forest and vegetation fire that broke out on Friday evening in the Drôme ravaged 220 hectares and “keep progressing“Said the prefecture on Tuesday evening. Located on the Diois massif in the town of Romeyer, the fire “has experienced a rapid spread in recent hours due to the change in wind direction“Explained the prefect of Drôme in a press release. “At 6:00 p.m., 220 hectares of forest had been covered” and “the fire continues to progress in several directions, in particular towards the RD 742“, he continued. Three sectors are particularly monitored by the approximately 280 firefighters who will be engaged on Tuesday evening in the field: the northern sector, the southern sector and the front sector (west) towards the village of Romeyer. Tactical fires are implemented to put the fire on an already burned ground in order to prevent its spread.
“During operations on Monday evening, two Gard firefighters and a Drôme firefighter were injured” and “all three were able to leave the hospital that day“, assured the prefecture. One of the firefighters who came as reinforcements from the Gard was burned in the face and the other two inhaled smoke, detailed to AFP on Tuesday afternoon Lieutenant-Colonel Ramon Navarro, senior management officer of the SDIS (departmental service fire and rescue) of the Drôme. There are currently no plans to evacuate homes, the administration concluded. Tuesday noon, firefighters received support from two heavy bomber helicopters and a Dash. In the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region, a fire in Isère caused by lightning, which ravaged a hundred hectares and also slightly injured three firefighters, was fixed for Tuesday evening, although the whole area is under active surveillance for the night. .
600 hectares burned and 500 threatened in Maine-et-Loire
The fire which started Monday August 8 in the forest of Pugle (Maine-et-Loire) has already burned around 600 hectares and 500 are still threatened, we learned on Tuesday from the prefecture and the firefighters. “620 hectares of forest have burned and the fire is not fixed“, said the firefighters to AFP. Two fire starts in Saint-Quentin and Saint-Martin, 15 km from the epicenter of the fire in Clefs-Val d’Anjou, were reported to AFP by residents, who feared that the flames would spread due to the wind.
According to the prefecture’s Twitter account, “317 men are engaged and 107 vehicles» are mobilized on the twenty sensitive points concerned. For her part, the sub-prefect of Maine-et-Loire Anny Pietri told AFP that the firefighters in intervention come from nine departments and that they would again resort to “aerial means“. A new water carrier should intervene in the afternoon. According to the same source, some farmers have helped by bringing water to the edges of the area using “tank tractors“. Earlier, the prefecture had mentioned on its Twitter page that “a dash“, a water bomber, had “was implemented in the eveningand would bedeployed again in the morning“.
About twenty people were also evacuated, most of whom were living in an accommodation center for disabled people, according to the sub-prefecture. 500 hectares are still in danger of going up in smoke. The prosecution previously mentioned about fifty evacuees. Maine-et-Loire SDIS Comptroller General Jean-Philippe Rivière said that “all sensitive points are taken care ofs” but that the fire “continues its progress towards the south“.
The fire resumes in Gironde
At least 320 hectares of pines were destroyed on Tuesday August 9 in the south of the Gironde by several outbreaks of fire from the gigantic Landiras fire in July, leading to the evacuation of several hundred inhabitants of Hostens, according to firefighters and the Hostens town hall. Three neighborhoods and four housing estates in the town of Hostens (1,300 inhabitants), on the border with the Landes, have been evacuated, the municipality announced on its Facebook account, which opened a security PC in the village hall.
According to city councilor Pascal Bizzari, some 500 people “at mostleft their homes to go, for the most part, to relatives. “Due to unfavorable weather conditions, renewed fires are observed near Landiras» on the sectors of «Cabanac, Hostens, Saint-Magne“, said in a tweet the prefecture of Gironde. According to an initial report sent by the Departmental Fire and Rescue Service (Sdis), these resumptions of fire burned “300 ha (of pines) in Saint-Magne” and “20 ha in Cabanac», near Landiras. Landiras had been the scene in July of a gigantic fire which swallowed nearly 14,000 ha of forest and which is still not “mastered” nowadays.
“These are hot spots that reactivated in the early afternoon, during the hottest hours of the day.“, explained the Departmental Fire and Rescue Service (Sdis) to AFP, describing a “fairly fast fire» and a situation «rather unfavorabledue to the warm southeast winds. “We see a very black smoke, 2 or 3 km from the village“, added the municipal councilor of Hostens according to whom”large land resourceswere implemented by the firefighters, without further details. “The fight is also underway on Sainte-Hélène in the Médoc, where a fire outbreak was reported at the start of the afternoon.“, burning 15 ha, also specified the Facebook account of the Gironde firefighters.
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