Alcoy prepares to fight fires

FIRE is a constant threat in inland Alicante despite all the local, regional and national governments’ preventative measures.

Alcoy is taking no chances with the forest fires that regularly assail the area and the town hall plans to install a firebreak on the perimeter of the Santiago Paya industrial estate.

This will protect the factories and industrial units as well as the Font Roja national park.  It will not have the aggressive environmental and visual impact of a conventional firebreak but will form an auxiliary strip where dense vegetation has been thinned to prevent flames from spreading.

Scrub, brush and undergrowth are also being cleared from accesses to Serelles in Sierra Mariola and a series of fire hydrants installed in the El Sargento and Barxell residential zones.

One Font Roja plan has already had to be abandoned, however. No local goatherds or shepherds have responded to the town hall invitation for tenders to graze their flocks in the Font Roja Park where they would crop the undergrowth to form a natural firebreak.