Fire Emergency: over 440 thousand liters of water released by AM helicopters in a month and a half of activity

(To air Force)
01/09/17

From mid-July, the Italian Air Force helicopters are operating in Sicily as part of the Defense in support of the Civil Protection for the fight against fires.

In particular, an HH-212 helicopter from the 80th CSAR (Combat Search and Rescue) Center of Decimomannu (Cagliari), equipped with a special bucket capable of loading about 750 liters of water, is deployed at the Trapani Birgi air base. in readiness with crews specialized in firefighting activities.

So far there have been about 90 flight hours, for a total of about 600 drops and more than 440.000 liters of water poured into the areas hit by the fires. The interventions, coordinated by the Air Operations Command of Poggio Renatico (Fe), in direct contact with the Unified Air Operational Center (COAU) of the Civil Protection, were mainly concentrated in some locations in the Sicily region of the provinces of Agrigento, Trapani and Palermo.

Firefighting was also carried out in the Sardinia region which once again employed an HH-212 helicopter of the 80 ° CSAR Center of Decimomannu (CA) in a mission to extinguish fires in Sorgono, in the province of Nuoro.

Firefighting is one of the dual abilities that the Air Force, in competition with other Armed Forces, makes available to the community on a daily basis in cases of public utility or in the event of a disaster, operating in this case in close synergy and in support of the various agencies and state bodies involved in rescue operations on the ground and in flight.