EU Crisis Management Commissioner Janez Lenarcic warned the Member States on Tuesday that the EU's capacity to fight forest fires has "reached its limit" after a record number of hectares went up in flames across the EU this summer.
"Since last June, we have received 11 requests for assistance through the European Civil Protection Mechanism and I must say that we have reached our capacity limit at the European level," said Lenarcic at the opening of an informal meeting in Brussels with 30 national governments participating in the mechanism.
"Some extreme fires in some Member States have not led to a request for assistance because the country knew there was no capacity available," the Slovenian commissioner stated.
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He sees aerial firefighting equipment as the main challenge. “Given the way the market is organised, we must act now to avoid a shortage next year. This means that additional capacity in the commercial market must now be reserved for next summer,” he said.
By mid-August, forest fires in Europe had so far burned more than 700,000 hectares this year, the highest number this time of year since 2006.
