It is announced that today, the 1st of September 2007, ground forces, air means and machinery have been allocated to the appropriate services of the General Secretariat for Civil Protection, to face the on going fires all over the country.
The Armed Forces responding to their role of contribution to fire fighting, fulfilled 100 % of all requests submitted by the authorities involved, allocating the following personnel and means :
• Prefecture of Arkadia : 318 persons
• Prefecture of Evia : 20 persons
• Prefecture of Ilia : 254 persons
• Prefecture of Corinth : 81 persons
• Prefecture of Lakonia : 18 persons
• Prefecture of Messinia : 81 persons
• Prefecture of Ioannina : 42 persons
• 328 mounted patrols for forest fire protection with 1.173 persons
• 2 chain saws Platoons (60 persons) with relevant equipment (chain saws etc)
• TOTALLY : 2.068 persons
• Surveillance flights for forest fire protection : 25 exits with 62 flight hours
• 19 firefighting aircraft CL-215 (13/11) and CL-415 (8/8), which conducted 29 sorties with 92 flight hours, and 580 water-bomb drops, equal to 3.770 tons of water (91% availability of air means)
• international fire fighting aircrafts (2 French, 2 Spanish and 1 Croatian CL-415) : 10 sorties with 32 flight hours
• 4 CHINOOK helicopters
• 8 UH-1H
• 2 U-17 aircraft
• 4 Super Pumas
• 2 Sikorsky helicopters
• 1 P-3B aircraft
• 2 AB-212 helicopters
• 4 Ambulances
• also buses, fire fighting vehicles, water carriers, Steyer vehicles, generator units, and other equipment, as requested by the General Secretariat for Civil Protection
• 40 Engineers earth moving equipments (bulldozers, leveling graders, loaders, dumpers etc)
• 17 veterinaries have been forwarded to the Prefectures of Messinia, Ilia and Arcadia
Finally, it should be noted that additional forces and equipment remain in full readiness, in order to intervene and contribute to the fire fighting, when called upon.
LTC Charalambos Laloussis
HNDGS Spokesman