2024-03-08 02:16:20
The prevention and response to risks from natural disasters was at the center of the event, which was organized on Monday afternoon by the Epirus Department of the Technical Chamber of Greece with the Department of Civil Protection of the Epirus Region.
In his greeting, the president of the TEE/TH, Yiannis Tsigros, after pointing out the open support and communication with the Directorate of Civil Protection and especially from its Coordinator Dimitris Mavrioiorgos, stated that the main area of cooperation between the two bodies in recent years was mainly earthquake planning and the management plans for possible disasters, which may arise from an intense seismic phenomenon. “Already in this area, special preparatory work had been done between the Directorate of Civil Protection and the TEE/TH, in order to examine all the schools in the city, which are built mainly with load-bearing masonry or those that were erected before the application of the latest anti-seismic regulations . Now, following the intervention of the TEE in collaboration with the OASP, a register of engineers is being created, who will examine approximately 30,000 public buildings throughout the territory with a Primary Seismic Inspection in the next two years. Something that is expected to prevent many dangerous situations for our fellow citizens”, he emphasized.
He made special reference to the intense phenomena created by the effects of climate change. “We have noticed the occurrence of particularly large natural disasters, such as the example of the floods in Thessaly, which we now have to anticipate and prepare properly, so that in the first instance we do not mourn the loss of human lives and then to reduce the cost of disasters , which they can bring about. Also particularly important are the problems that can be created by forest fires and the way we have to deal with them, in order to avoid phenomena like those that happened in Mati, where Urban Planning was non-existent”, he pointed out.
The head of the Department of Natural Disasters of the General Secretariat mentioned the drawing up of plans to deal with natural disasters and the organized preventive evacuation of citizens in the event of a forest fire, as well as the great responsibility that municipalities now assume for the drawing up and implementation of plans to deal with natural disasters of Civil Protection Andreas Antonakos, who presented in detail what the plans for dealing with natural disasters include and how the organized preventive evacuation of citizens in the event of a forest fire is carried out, with examples from areas of Ioannina and with detailed instructions on who and how decide to make an organized removal of citizens.
Afterwards, Materials Science engineer Nancy Mavrioiorgou analyzed the evacuation method and the decisions that must be made to evacuate a coastal settlement due to a forest fire, so that the citizens or tourists who are in the settlement can be safely removed.
Eleni Vlachou, the rapporteur of the Department of Documentation and Cartographic Support of the Emergency Planning Directorate of the General Secretariat of Civil Protection, in her turn, referred extensively to how areas are declared a Civil Protection emergency, while the event concluded with a speech on public awareness and volunteering in the Local Government, by the deputy governor of Volunteering and Solidarity, Kostas Kitsios, and the deputy head of the Department of Civil Protection of the P.E. Melina Kokori of Thesprotia.
Greetings were also addressed at the event by the regional governor of Epirus, Alexandros Kahrimanis, the regional coordinator of Civil Protection of the Epirus Region, Dimitris Mavrioorgos, and the Operations Coordinator of Epirus – Western Macedonia and the Islands, Christoforos Bokas.