In the triptych fewer fires; quick delineation to those who manifest and holistic approach In the case of large fires, the strategy that is expected to follow by the Ministry of Climate Crisis and Civil Protection during this year’s firefighting period, which begins on May 1st, is expected to follow.

Business doctrine applied last year will be guide and for this year with the rapid response to the field being one of the main axes.

According to data released this year by firefighters, they number more than 18,000 (15,500 permanent, 2,500 seasonal) firefighters.

This number, according to the political leadership of the ministry, and the prime minister also pointed out at a recent meeting at the ministry, is greater than ever and is increased by 20% by 2023.

Forces include units of forestry which consist of 1,600 people and now the Special Forestry Units (EMME) will reach 20 (4 more units based in Chania, Ilia Evia and Zakynthos). In particular, the 4 new ones are expected to be staffed with 163 people, namely 52 in Chalkida, 42 in Chania, 45 in Pyrgos and 24 in Zakynthos. At the same time, the Prepositioning Program through the European Civil Protection Mechanism will also be implemented this year – a total of 294 European firefighters from the Czech Republic, France, Romania, Moldova and Bulgaria will be in Greece to assist Greek fellow citizens.

Increased will be the number of volunteers As according to figures published by the Minister of Climate Crisis and Civil Protection, Yiannis Kefalogiannis, the volunteers of the Fire Department will be 4,912 while civil protection volunteers amount to 5,700 of 295 organizations.

Citing overhead that the country has this year, as it has been disclosed by Civil Protection, in total they are calculated 80-85, of which 49 rented.

Regarding the vehicle fleet, they will reach about 3,700, and the number of drones will be reinforced compared to last year as a total of 82 will be available to civil protection (45 last year) for aerial surveillance, aiming to warn and prevention of fires.

The system of SEAs (unmanned aircraft systems), according to Civil Protection, is expected to expand to new high -risk areas such as Crete, Rhodes and the North Aegean islands. It is recalled that during last year’s firefighting period it was developed in areas such as Attica, Corinth, Arcadia, Boeotia, Laconia, Evia, Thessaloniki, the National Park of Valia Calda, Evros, Dadia, Xanthi and Thassos. In addition, it was used to monitor mixed zones of increased risk, such as the suburban areas of Thessaloniki, the forests of Western Greece and the protected areas of Epirus.

At the same time, the purposes of the plots will be crucial to prevention, whose deadline, although expired on April 30, was decided to extend until June 15.

At the same time the program is implemented Antinero For cleaning and creating firefighting zones in forest areas as well as the cleaning of high voltage network sites passing through forests as well as interventions in archaeological sites.

Finally, this year’s firefighting season will also be placed on interoperability and cooperation between all stakeholders, such as the Forest Service, the Armed Forces, all security forces, the first and second grade local government, EKAB etc.