It is a face well known to the inhabitants of the Mont-Blanc country. A 61-year-old volunteer firefighter died on Sunday afternoon in Saint-Gervais-les-Bains (Haute-Savoie) in a road accident on his way to an intervention, we learned from concordant sources.
The facts took place shortly after 1:15 p.m., at the Col de Voza, (1,657 m above sea level), when a fire truck from the town’s barracks, which was transporting five volunteer firefighters including the victim, had to stop on a road. snowy access to put on the chains. The crew had to contain a fire in an altitude restaurant.
In “circumstances which remain to be clarified”, the victim “came out of the vehicle with three of his colleagues, the last having remained behind the wheel. The truck began to back up before taking an embankment and overturning on the left side “where the missing man was, explained the Bonneville prosecution.
His colleagues tried everything to save him
The latter, “who had 30 years of professional experience as a volunteer firefighter and who was the former chief of the municipal police of Saint-Gervais-les Bains”, was killed instantly, according to the same source. “Extremely shocked”, the other firefighters of the crew, who acted immediately at the time of the accident, were taken to Sallanches hospital in a state of shock, added the prosecution.
In a tweet, the Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin expressed “his very great sadness at the announcement of the death” of the volunteer firefighter and offered his condolences “to his family, his colleagues from Sdis 74 (note: Departmental Service of Fire and Rescue) and his relatives”.
“The Prefect, the chairman of the board of directors of Sdis and the departmental director are currently on site, in contact with the teams and the family to whom they offer all their condolences”, for his part indicated in a press release the Sdis of Haute-Savoie, specifying that “the victim was married and the father of three children”. The investigation was entrusted to the Chamonix gendarmerie research brigade, according to the prosecution.