Emmanuel Macron had promised it shortly before his victory. “This five-year term will be ecological or it will not be”, he launched during his meeting in Marseille on April 16. Three months later, after a presidential campaign where the environment was sorely absent from the debates, the climate emergency was reminded to the Head of State. Suddenly, by the heat wave which hit the country for several days, and dramatically, by the “megafires” which set the country ablaze, particularly in Gironde where some 20,600 hectares of pines burned in the space of one week. Wednesday July 20, when the fire seemed to be under control, the president went to the scene, in Teste-de-Buche, in the Arcachon basin not far from the famous campsite Les Flots bleus now reduced in ashes, then in Langon, at the command post of the Landiras fire.
Saluting the “human chain” who deployed for beat the beast that is fire »the Head of State was first confused in thanks, to the firefighters, “absolute heroes” whom he greeted one by one, with civil security personnel, elected officials and all the volunteers mobilized to come to the aid of the 36,000 evacuees and confront the flames “of one of the greatest fires in our history”, did he describe. “I want here to tell you the solidarity of the nation and my immense pride (…) to see this fortitude in our elected officials, in our compatriots, in our firefighters, in those who are mobilized “he listed, announcing the requisition of two civilian helicopters to help the work of the firefighters.
After the Covid-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine, Emmanuel Macron faces here, once again, the unprecedented and the tragic. Describing the situation, the Comptroller General Marc Vermeulen, head of the Gironde fire brigade, did not fail to share his amazement. After July 14, when temperatures soared to over 40°C, the trunks of twenty-year-old pines “exploded under the effect of the heat”he recounted, recalling having a dreaded time of “lose two guys”.
A prevention campaign
This exceptional situation will have made Emmanuel Macron more ” iron “ more of his compatriots. “Despite this, there are no casualties “, he underlined. Admittedly, a few houses, campsites, a restaurant… will have been wiped off the map, but given the disaster at work, the disaster seems to have been contained. And it is a message of optimism and voluntarism that the Head of State wanted to send, while the Canadairs were still moving in the sky, to mention ” the day after “.
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