From West to East, Portugal, Spain, France, Italy and Greece are the most affected Member States this year. Severe measures are put in place in order to avoid more damages triggered by heatwaves, but in order to provide the lifeline for those in need, support services require adequate resources. The resources available EU-wide for crisis management do not match today’s needs. Firefighters have been hit in particularly by high inflation rates and lacking pay increases, personnel cuts following the pandemic and insufficient investment in equipment. At the same time, more heat means also more pressure to perform leading to occupational stress. All these elements contribute to very hard and dangerous working conditions for firefighters.

To respond to this reality, CESI advocates for:

• additional investment in the public services, in particular for fire fighters and other emergency and response services – with attention to working under psychological pressure;
• more sharing of good practices, expertise and information between practitioners, above all fire-fighters, and experts – which could lead to an improved harmonisation of national protocols for fire management across Europe;
• increased transparency and awareness of and for the work performed by the European Commission in natural disaster management (e.g. in the context of the Expert Group on Forest Fires) and the different applicable EU concepts, tools and programs available in this field;
• the creation of a genuine ‘EU strategy for combating forest fires’ to foster better cooperation and coordination across Member States in forest fire mitigation;
• a European status for rescuers;
• better interoperability of material and equipment for fire fighters and sharing of assets across the Member States.

Alain Laratta, Secretary General of the French firefighters union ‘Avenir Secours’, said: “Once more, as summer arrives, forest fires lead to devastating situations and loss. When action endangers the operational staff, no one can invoke notions of cost to guarantee the safety of those who protect us. I salute all the public officials involved on all fronts to combat the devastating effects of forest fires, I wish to give them our full support. I advocate in favour a European approach to combatting forest fires with sufficient investments in both the human resources available and in the technical means to fight fires, for instance through the acquisition of mixed ‘super tankers’ to adapt  missions to applicable contexts and alternative fire fighting means like drones. Even if the situation is worrying, I remain confident in the ability of European public administrations to demonstrate agility and adaptability in a constrained and hostile context.”

CESI General Secretary Klaus Heeger concluded: “The current extreme heat waves and forest fires, but also the torrential rains and floods that we are repeatedly experiencing, are a constant reminder that our climate is losing balance. We need to act fast, and we need to protect first the ones that protect us: firefighters, civil defence officers, doctors and other emergency or rescue service personnel. Climate change  mitigation is going to be a long and enduring battle to fight and we need to support the ones that are facing it in the front lines!”