A major international exercise, the first in Sardinia, to test the fight against forest fires in view of the summer. “Ita Eu Modex 2025” will be held from 7 to 11 April between Nuoro, Mamoiada and Orani and was presented today at the headquarters of the regional Civil Protection. Camps and strategies for fighting the flames, with the presence of around 500 operators from six European Union countries: Austria, Bulgaria, Greece, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia. The simulated evacuation of a retirement home is also scheduled.

There will be 7 modules in total: 6 specialized in fighting fires on land from Austria, Bulgaria, Greece, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia, the remaining one - also from Greece - specialized in fighting fires with air vehicles . Each module will be self-sufficient, as happens in the case of a real international emergency. And it will be composed of about 50 operators each, including experts in extinguishing and logistics and 75 vehicles.

The scenarios are all included in the wooded areas of the municipalities of Nuoro, Mamoiada and Orani . The base camp from which the extinguishing operations will start has been identified in the spaces of the former nursery of the Forestas Agency, in the Su Pinu area, the next location of the training school of the Forestry Corps and Environmental Surveillance. The exercise will simulate a large forest fire, including a part that also includes an interface fire.

"An international exercise involving several European countries, in which for the first time Nuoro and Sardinia are put at the center," said the president of the Region Alessandra Todde. "It is a way to test different scenarios. Of course there is the issue of forest fires, but there is also the issue of the emergency and the work of civil protection in the round . I must say that I am very proud that this exercise is taking place in Nuoro and is taking place above all in a context, in a territory that has rarely been put at the center in the past."

The European Union funding is 200,000 euros . The environment councilor Rossana Laconi underlined the importance of the exercise: «It also helps us learn coordination in the face of these emergencies in consideration of even dramatic events linked to climate change», she explained. «It allows us to fine-tune the system of the European Union Civil Protection Mechanism, which we too, unfortunately, had to resort to on the occasion of the tragic fire of Montiferru in 2021, when we needed to get help from abroad».

This is the first time that Sardinia has hosted an exercise of the so-called Union Civil Protection Mechanism, created in 2001 to deal with major emergencies that cannot be responded to without the support of an international intervention. The 27 countries of the European Union are part of it, plus 10 others outside the EU. For security reasons, the exercise will not be open to the public .

(Unioneonline/r.sp.)

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