- Were the Orihuela Costa fires a strategy to provide new areas in which to build more tourist housing
- According to the President of Amigos de Sierra Escalona, the previous Consell was processing the land in PAU 5 with the purpose of declassifying it for construction.
The fire gave little respite to the extinguishing teams at the tail end of last week. Having destroyed 12 hectares of woodland between the Campoamor and Las Ramblas golf courses on Thursday it reactivated on Friday afternoon with the arrival of the wind.
The strong breeze seemingly fanned some of the embers around 4:00 p.m. however, firefighters, however, soon had the situation under control again and the aerial resources were withdrawn.
A security team remained overnight once again with two fire tenders as they continued to cool the perimeter. The Local Police drones were also flying over the affected area.
Having been extinguished early on Friday morning the fire appeared again on Friday afternoon near the post-transfer canal, close to the point where it first broke out the previous day.
Although the earlier fire spread from the Las Ramblas Golf toward to the Campoamor course, this time it remained static, close to Las Ramblas. “The reactivation happened very quickly,” according to Miguel Montero, the NCO in command of the firefighting operation.
Given the situation, the fire tender that remained present during Friday had to call in additional support, including the air resources, which had previously withdrawn. A helicopter and a seaplane poured continuous discharges of water onto the flames which proved very effective in preventing their advance, according to the Councilor for Emergencies, Víctor Valverde, “which had become quite high and alarming.”
Initially many witnesses described moments of tension when the fire was spreading close to their homes, on Calle Rambla de Oleza, where the Police had to evacuate around twenty residents, whose houses were close to the flames. The golf course itself, which opened its sprinklers to the maximum, acted as an artificial firewall against the virulence of the fire, which has remained at the edge of the fairways. There was also concern about the passage of an underground gas pipeline nearby.
Firefighters were once again busy controlling this part of the fire that once again provided moments of tension to many residents of Orihuela Costa, who watched in astonishment at the column of smoke that the new fire generated, a column that was visible from many different points of the Oriola coast.
The Generalitat’s forest fire crews remained on the scene putting out all the embers of the fire in the area closest to the Campoamor golf course. The flames on this flank brushed the Avenida Conde de Barcelona and reached almost to the roundabout bearing the statue of the golfer close to the Campoamor clubhouse and sports hotel.
The possible trigger of the fire is still unknown as the Civil Guard continues its investigation, with no hypothesis ruled out. However, the spokesperson for the Association of Friends of Sierra Escalona, Miguel Ángel Pavón, said that the fire, which got very close to protected areas, has put environmental groups on alert as many of them consider that it could simply have been a ploy that would provide new areas in which to build more tourist housing.
