The fire was accidentally discovered from the air around 3 p.m. on Saturday – by the crew of a police helicopter who was on a mission in the Salzkammergut. A little later, calls were received every minute from hikers who noticed a column of smoke from a mountain opposite.
Two police helicopters from Upper Austria and Salzburg transported extinguishing water to the fire site yesterday. And thanks to a forest road “only” 600 meters away, the fire brigade can get to the scene of the fire. However, the fire was fueled again and again by the prevailing wind.
Fire crews must be secured
Ten fire brigades and forest fire experts from the St. Agatha base are on duty, as are 20 mountain rescue workers to secure the fire-fighting crews in the steep terrain.
“We were able to bring more than 50,000 liters of extinguishing water to the fire site on Saturday, a great achievement by our teams,” said Gmunden’s district fire brigade commander Stefan Schiendorfer. The conflagration has now been extinguished, but embers are still demanding. “It goes up to half a meter deep into the ground under the tree roots because it’s very dry.” It involves tedious manual work and bringing the extinguishing water into the ground with lances. Thanks to a drone with a thermal imaging camera, the situation can be explored and assessed accordingly in order to be able to take targeted action against hot spots. “It’s a tremendous help,” says district fire chief Stefan Schiendorfer.
It did rain a little on Saturday evening, but that wasn’t enough. The cause of the fire has not yet been clarified, it is probably the result of a lightning strike on Saturday night. “In any case, no hiking trail leads past there. This site is remote, on steep, rough terrain. Normally nobody gets there.”
Source: Nachrichten
