As Marseille reels from early summer wildfire, France rolls back environmental protections

FRANCE 24 English

Visit our website: http://www.france24.com  Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FRANCE24.English  Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/France24_en

Transcript

00:00Hello and welcome. You're watching France 24.

00:04Coming up in Marseille, firefighters stabilized the wildfire that brought flames to the outskirts of France's second largest city.

00:12The blaze, though far from extinguished, more than 300 treated for smoke inhalation.

00:16Fire is also easing, it seems, in Spain's Catalonia region.

00:21Mathilde Céleste of Le Figaro newspaper is in the Mediterranean port city.

00:26As Ukraine picks up the pieces from another massive onslaught of drones, more than 700,

00:32we'll review that cabinet meeting in Washington where Donald Trump seems to have disowned his defense secretary's order

00:39to pause anti-aircraft battery deliveries for Kyiv.

00:44A surprise quintet of African leaders invited for lunch at the White House.

00:49The presidents of Liberia, Senegal, Gabon, Mauritania and Guinea-Bissau, David Smith in Washington, tells us why.

00:59Coming up in the next hour, the France 24 debate.

01:02Will Kenya's heavy-handed police silence Gen Z protesters?

01:0750 killed in the past two weeks of demonstrations.

01:11What can a largely leaderless movement obtain in the face of this crackdown?

01:15President Ruto, who insists he's not budging, was this, as some have called it, an avoidable showdown?

01:23This in one of Africa's few democracies.

01:25Your reactions on the hashtag F24Debate.

01:28Hello everyone, I'm François Picard.

01:44Firefighters in Marseille say the blaze has been stabilized.

01:49The one that brought flames to the 16th arrondissement, forcing hundreds of evacuation and hundreds more

01:58to go to hospital with smoke inhalation stabilized, but not yet put out.

02:06France, which is preparing for the worst.

02:10It's that firefighters are nothing new in the French Riviera.

02:14However, this early in the season, that's what's alarming the locals.

02:18Charlotte Hughes has the story.

02:23In this village in southwestern France, local authorities are doing all they can to protect the environment.

02:30There's a high risk of wildfires.

02:32Access to the hills is banned until the end of the week.

02:34A ban that suggests a gruelling summer ahead, with the threat of fires looming large.

02:39Last year in France, 4,591 outbreaks were recorded by the start of July.

02:475,907 have already been reported for the same period this year.

02:53Partly responsible for this increase is a particularly rainy march that made vegetation more dense.

02:58With the June heatwave and periods of drought, forests have become highly flammable.

03:04In Marseille, there was 99% less rainfall this year than usual.

03:09A lack of rain that has been worsening for several years now, as is the case in the city of Narbonne,

03:14where only 5.4 millimetres of rain fell last month.

03:18For firefighters, this points to a high-risk summer.

03:21Conditions in the 30-30-30 rule are a particular cause for concern.

03:27Temperatures in excess of 30 degrees, winds in excess of 30 kilometres per hour, and air humidity below 30%.

03:34A dangerous mix, especially when combined with a particular kind of wind, known as tramontane wind.

03:42It's a continental wind, which means it has much less humidity than if it came from the sea.

03:47This means it acts like a hairdryer on areas that are already fully dried out.

03:52In light of the increased fire risks, new technologies are being developed,

03:56including cameras that use AI for early detection of lasers.

04:01And for more, let's cross to Marseille.

04:03Mathilde Céleste is correspondent for Le Figaro newspaper.

04:06Thank you for being with us here on France 24.

04:11So the order was keep the windows closed. Is that the case behind you there?

04:14Not where we lived, but actually it was now when the people are allowed to go back to the places,

04:23what the authorities said, because the fire is almost poured out.

04:29The authorities said that like a couple of minutes ago.

04:34But yeah, at the beginning, it was really, very frightening because I've lived there for like 10 years.

04:40And for the very first time, we smelled the fire.

04:44We still saw also, you know, the smoke, even if it was quite far away from where we work here at the centre of Marseille.

04:52That's why it was quite impressive for the people here in Marseille.

04:55Yeah, for people who don't know the city, you have the old port and then around it, it's hills.

05:01And it's in the hills of the 16th arrondissement where they were the most worried.

05:07Yeah, yeah. And the reason why it was quite the people, the authorities were quite frightened.

05:14But what happened is because the 15th arrondissement, as you said, it's a place where poor people live.

05:21Lots, lots of people live there.

05:23And we were quite frightened of the damages of the fire could be done.

05:29But hopefully there were no people died in this fire.

05:35But it could be, it could have been really worse.

05:40Yeah, the fires in that northern part, and as you can see from this map,

05:47the fire is located between the city and the airport.

05:53Yeah, yeah.

05:54Actually, the fire started because of a car which burned on the highway nearby.

06:00And because of the winds, because the winds blew really, really, really strong,

06:05the fire spread to the hills first, to a city near Marseille, 15 kilometers from Marseille,

06:11called Les Pes de Mirabeau.

06:12And then in two hours, the fire burned 30 hectares, which shows how fast the fire went yesterday.

06:21Mathilde Célès, it's been a week where in the French Parliament,

06:25they've rolled back some environmental legislation.

06:30This is a topic that seemed to go on the back burner in the rough and tumble of French politics.

06:36You know, how to decarbonize the economy, how to prepare for the new normal with increased extreme weather events.

06:45Where you are, has the conversation changed now?

06:48I mean, actually, I don't think I understand, sorry.

06:54Is there, does this put a newfound urgency when it comes to the whole question of climate change,

07:02which had been on the back burner?

07:04I'm not sure, actually.

07:08Firstly, now in Marseille, we have to, you know, go on and, like, try to have people which have lost their houses and so on.

07:19I think next, after we will talk about the political consequences that people should think about.

07:26But now it's not the priority, you know, now in Marseille, because, you know, like, 10 houses have been completely destroyed.

07:33400, 400, sorry, people have been evacuated.

07:38So now, the most important thing now is after the crisis.

07:42Mathilde Célès, many thanks for joining us from the Mediterranean port city of Marseille.

07:48Thank you for hosting me.

Category

Transcript

Recommended