Major fire brigade operation in East Tyrol: A forest fire broke out in Sillian on Friday afternoon and spread quickly due to the strong wind. More than a hundred firefighters are battling the flames. The operation had to be interrupted at night. On Saturday the situation was said to be under control.
A forest fire on Sillianberg was reported to the Tyrol control center on Friday afternoon around 4:30 p.m. After the local fire brigade was alerted, “alert level 2 was immediately activated by the operations manager. At the same time, the helicopter from the Ministry of the Interior was also requested.”
“Extreme fire spread” due to wind
During a reconnaissance flight with operational management, an “extreme fire spread” was discovered due to the strong wind. “It was immediately clear to operational management that additional helicopters had to be requested via the state warning center to get the incident under control,” the fire brigade said.
By evening the fire was contained to an area of approximately six to eight hectares. For safety reasons, the operation had to be interrupted at night. Firefighting continued in the early hours of Saturday – both on the ground and from the air. In total, there are almost 150 emergency services on site.
“Carefully extinguishing embers is essential”
The initial rapid spread of the fire was limited by the rapid and targeted deployment of emergency services. “The operation is currently under control. According to the weather forecasts, there should be small amounts of precipitation in the near future, but also strong winds. For this reason, it is essential to carefully extinguish the embers,” said operations manager Bernd Kukla on Saturday morning.
The rapid response also prevented the fire from spreading eastwards into the populated area, district fire inspector Franz Brunner said. To date, nothing is known about the cause of the fire.
Source: Krone
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