About forty volunteers of the Local Civil Protection Group of Totana reinforce, with mobile surveillance work and technical and human support, the work of fire prevention in order to support the forestry brigades of the Ministry of Environment during this summer in the territory corresponding to this municipality within the regional park of Sierra Espuña.
The mayor, Andrés García, and the councilor for Citizen Security and Emergencies, Agustín Gonzalo Martínez, and the head of Civil Protection, José María Sánchez Pascual, accompanied the volunteers at the beginning of their surveillance day.
The visit had the purpose of knowing the reinforcement work that is being done to the forestry brigades of the Autonomous Community every day of the summer in their itineraries and checkpoints and surveillance in areas of high danger.
These works are developed within the framework of the Emergency Civil Protection Plan for Forest Fires in the Region of Murcia (Plan INFOMUR), with which it is intended to establish the hierarchical and functional organization, in order to protect people, property and the environment.
The Infomur Plan is in force from mid-June and until September 30, focusing its activity on surveillance, extinction or coordination tasks.
For the second year in a row, volunteers from Civil Protection have joined the mobile surveillance tasks, who monitor, as is the case, the main natural areas of Sierra Espuña corresponding to the municipal area of ​​Totana.
Totana volunteers have been working daily since June 15 and until early September in strategic areas of Sierra Espuña, such as La Santa, the box of the Heart of Jesus, the Big Raft, the Forest House and Las Alquerías deposit , Collado Bermejo, Casa Rosa, Caruana, Purgatory, Llano de Las Cabras, Cañada de Prior and the intersection of Casas Nuevas, among others.
These patrols are coordinated from the Operations Coordination Center, also known as CECOP, which has as one of its functions the coordination of forest patrols throughout the province.
Each one of the forest patrols of Civil Protection of Totana, is integrated by two volunteers and a vehicle equipped with the necessary material to be able to confront an immediate forest emergency, they carry out several routes programmed by the different places of the natural park.
These volunteers have had prior technical training and allow them to be in constant communication with the forestry brigades.
Each patrol has a route to be determined before starting the service, each route having an average of 80 kilometers and which includes the surveillance of the entire Sierra Espuña natural park and surroundings that belong to the Totana municipal area, having both as a base in route the sentry box that is in the Heart of Jesus, serving this as a logistical base and stopping at meal times.
This service is joined by the new Mobile Command Unit that allows operational communications with the entire forest emergency device in the Region.
The first of these routes includes the surveillance of the entire area of ​​La Santa, the Balsa Grande and Las Alquerías until the Collado Bermejo, having a very wide view of the entire Barranco de Enmedio and from the Collado Pilón to the Corazón de Jesús.
The second route is centered on the west and back of the mountains, taking Totana as a reference, reaching the Casas Nuevas junction located on the border of the municipality with the terms of Mula and Lorca, passing through places such as Finca Caruana, Purgatory, Llano de las Cabras and Cañada Prior.
These routes are made throughout the entire time zone that the patrols stay on route, as explained.
The municipal officials thanked the work that these volunteers have been developing these months in Sierra Espuña and noted that their work represents an example of partnership for their solidarity, prevention, collaboration and involvement, given that their commitment and commitment are a very good example for the rest of the society.
In addition, they added that all of them dedicate their time to others in an altruistic way, collaborating in guaranteeing the safety of our mountain range and of all citizens;
and they reiterated that the least we can do from the administration is to thank them for their work publicly and offer them our public thanks and the necessary resources to carry out that task.
Finally, they recalled some recommendations to avoid forest fires at this time of year that there is a maximum risk.
