This document summarizes wildfire strategies in Southern France. It discusses: 1) The wildfire context in Southern France, including extreme weather conditions in summer that can cause fires to spread very quickly. 2) France's wildfire management approach, which focuses on prevention, early containment, and massive attacks with aerial and ground resources if fires grow large. 3) The resources available for wildfire suppression in Southern France, including over 40,000 firefighters, police, and military personnel as well as 26 aircraft and 16 aerial retardant bases.

1. INTERNATIONAL MEETING
2017
124ème congrès national des sapeurs-pompiers de France
11 – 14 octobre 2017 – Ajaccio
October 13rd, Friday

2. WILDFIRE STRATEGY
Christophe Frerson SDIS2B-EMIZDS Sud
christophe.frerson@interieur.gouv.fr

3. CORSICA
Southern France
Forest fire location in France

4. 50% of French crisis occur in southern France.
It manages all kind of risks.
3 regions, Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur, (French Riviera)
Occitanie and Corsica,
21 departments (+2 during fire season).
It serves 10 Million inhabitants and several millions of tourists
over a territory of 112,804 km². 900 Kms wide
Southern Zonal Prefecture – Safety & Security

5. WILDFIRES MANAGEMENT IN
SOUTHERN FRANCE
CEZOC BUILDING
CeZOC

6. Centre Zonal Opérationnel de Crise

7. COZ CRISIS ROOM
ZONAL OPERATION CENTER

8. COZ LOCATION

9. 3 main missions: Anticipation – Provider – Coordination
• Coordination of national fleet of firefighter aircraft;
• Manage all search and rescue helicopters;
• Could dispatch resources with 40,000 firefighters:
professionals, volunteers, soldiers and civil protection military
force of 1,000 staff to reinforce fire departments.
• 24,000 policemen – 16,000 gendarmes (military policemen)
• 15 permanent staff 24/7 during fire season
COZ
Southern regional interagency
coordinator center named “COZ Sud”

10. • Fire season – June to end of September
• High urbanization and density of population
• Large areas of wildland urban interface
« WUI »
• Extreme fires that require deployment of
many resources
WILDFIRES CONTEXT IN
FRANCE

11. WILDFIRES CONTEXT IN
FRANCE
Extreme weather conditions in July-August:
• Temperatures near 40°C
• Very strong winds, gusty, sometimes more than > 100
km/h
• Humidity between 10 or 20% in extreme conditions
• High level of urbanization - WUI – large population
and strong economic activity
• Large influx of tourists in summer

12. Conditions which result:
Very powerful fires that can spread > 2000 m/h
even 5000 to 7000 m/h observed
Fire/population interfaces difficult to manage,
containment is priority. Only evacuation for the
vulnerable structures such as camping or mobile home.
Damage or disruptions on economic activities (blackouts,
closure of highways, railroads)
WILDFIRES CONTEXT IN
FRANCE

13. Extreme fires require implementing many
resources:
Thousands of men, hundreds of vehicles
More than dozen aircraft simultaneously, different
types (helicopter, scooper, air tanker)
WILDFIRES CONTEXT IN
FRANCE

14. French forest fire strategy
2 main principles:
•Global approach for fire prevention and suppression
•Anticipation: location, time, resources, think before,
organize priority , fire behavior, ongoing operations
4 main objectives:
•Preventing all fire start : patrol, watchtower, DFCI
•Controlling spread in early stages : DFCI, defend lines,
access tracks
•avoiding catastrophic developments : Massive attack
aerial & ground
•Rehabilitating areas destroyed by fire : less vulnerable
in the future – loops to DFCI
French forest fire strategy since 1994

15. Fire Management, suppression, fuel
removing, prescribed fire with Partners:
• National resources (Ministry of the
interior)
• DDAF (Ministry of Agriculture)
• ONF (Ministry of Agriculture)
• Forestry services (County)
• Local Patrols (Mayor)
• Scouts
French forest fire strategy since 1994
French forest fire strategy

16. • National forest fire school
• National training program (3 to 5)
• Departmental School (1to2,3)
• Departmental exercises
• Regional exercises
• And european exercises
Virtual reality platform:
• Realisitic, complex inputs
• Cheaper than real full scale exercises
• Learn by trial and errors
National Training Program

17. Virtual reality platform
Movie of
valabre
center
National Training proram

18. FOREST FIRE RESOURCES

19. Rotary wings : 10 + 20 helicopters
8 EC145 : Command and drops monitoring
2 PUMA + light helicopter : Helitack operations
20 counties helitacks, resources contracted with FRS
3 Beechcraft
Air Attack &
coordination
9 Tracker S2F
Retardant
12 Canadair CL415
Water / Retardant
2 DASH8 QS400
Water / Retardant
Fixed wings : 26 aircraft
and 16 aerial retardant bases (19 total)
Forest fire National aerial resources

20. PREDICTIVE SERVICE
INTERAGENCY MEETING 2 TIMES / DAY
9:30 & 17:00

21. Low Light Moderate High Very high Extreme
Average distribution during
fire season since 1992
Air patrols when severe weather conditions :
ORANGE - High = air patrol with conditions
RED - Very high = air patrol over location defined with
« Meteo France analisys » + ground patrols
BLACK - Extreme = several races of air patrols + lot of ground
patrols
AERIAL FIREFIGHTING STRATEGY
Very High 69 Corse 36
Extreme 11 Corse 3
Number of days 2017

22. RACES OF AIR PATROLS

23. RACES OF AIR PATROLS :
135 IN SUMMER 2017

24. Before - During
INTERDEPARTMENTAL REINFORCEMENT

25. FIRE SUPPRESSION RESPONSE
1. Fast initial attack
2. Massive attack
3. Priority to fire ignition
• Combine Aerial & Ground Patrols = Resources assigned based on risk analysis
• Short time = Reducing response time by increasing units on the ground and
patrols
• Safety = Increasing collective and personal safety
Based on 3 main actions:

26. • Air Patrols
Adapted and proportioned response : resources activated
and deployed accordingly to the fire danger (D-1) :
– Aerial retardant bases (call to open)
– Counties resources Ground forces and helitacks Type 2
• Fast detection
– Prepositioned resources, watch towers, remote sensors
(cameras, …), aerial monitoring system operational GIS
• Massive Attacks = Strong resources in the first 5 minutes
– Aerial patrol : 2 Trackers (S2F) with retardants available
“G.A.AR. = Guet Aerien ARmé” and Ground forces
FIREFIGHTING STRATEGY
1) Very fast initial attack
Aerial fire strategy

27. FIRST = AERIAL PATROL

28. FOREST FIRE PRIMARY UNITS
 Forest Fire Truck
 GIFF (Strike Team)
 GIL (Heavy Strike Team)
Water spray – self
protection
Mini 3500 Liters
or

29. • Heavy resources deployed in the first minutes
4 to 6 Canadairs – “train of aerial resources” + 1 DASH
Sometimes wave = all resources available
AERIAL FIREFIGHTING
STRATEGY
2) Massive attack
Aerial fire strategy

30. FOREST FIRE ADDITIONAL UNITS
 GIR (Retardant)
 Water tank team (20 000 L of Water)
 DIH (hot shot crew with water) linked with chopper
 Fire Structure Strike Team

31. Area burnt from 1992 to 2016 Almost
17,000 ha
in 2017
RESULTS

32. RESULTS
FIRES > 10 HA AND AIRCRAFT INVOLVED

33. 70% OF ORIGINS ARE KNOWN

34. 2017: Almost 10,000 drops
and 8,000 flight hours

35. 2017 SPECIFICITIES

36. AERIAL MONITORING SYSTEM
X 2

37. OPERATIONAL IMPLEMENTATION
Improve situation awareness :
–Real time video
–High quality pictures, movie and zoom
–Infrared sensor
–Tracking
–Measurement of distances and perimeters
Aerial monitoring system features

38. EUROPEAN AERIAL MODULE

40. THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION