The department is however still placed “in yellow alert for the risk of fire fires” because of the weather conditions and “the state of drought of the massif”, according to the prefecture.
Le Monde with AFP
The fires which had ravaged more than 22,000 hectares of forest in Gironde in the municipalities of Landiras this summer and Saumos in mid-September were declared extinct by the prefecture on Wednesday evening September 28. Another fire, which had touched the town of Arès, in the Arcachon basin has also been officially extinguished according to a press release unveiled in the evening.
In Landiras, a commune in the heart of the Landes forest, a first fire had declared itself in July, and had burned around 12,500 hectares according to the prefecture. In August, it was relaunched in a scorching heat, thus causing a “Landiras 2”. In one night, 5,000 hectares of pines were reduced to ashes. In total, the Gironde prefecture reports just over 6,700 hectares burned. Landiras 2 had led to the arrival of reinforcements from all over Europe, in addition to local firefighters, to avoid a new recovery.
The end of the fires in Landiras thus leads to the lifting of “specific restrictions of access to the forest massifs affected in the municipalities of Belin-Béliet, Saint-Magne and Hostens”, located in the sector.
Yellow vigilance
In the heart of an exceptionally dry summer, the town of Saumos near Lacanau had been affected in mid-September. About 3,400 hectares were devoured by the flames, 1,840 people evacuated, before the fire was declared fixed a few days later.
These new extinguished fires, against a background of a cooler and rainy weather in Gironde, mark the end of a busy and trying season for firefighters from all over the country. In July, the Gironde was also affected by the Teste-de-Buch fire on the Arcachon basin. After having ravaged after ten days 7,000 hectares of forest, he was declared extinguished on August 25. More than 20,000 people had been evacuated. Despite everything, the department is still placed “in yellow vigilance for the risk of fire fires” because of the weather conditions and the “state of drought of the massif” can be read in the press release.