Slovak firefighting pilots completed their mission in the Czech Switzerland National Park on Monday. They had been helping to extinguish a large fire there since 27 July. The Czech Interior Minister confirmed this to the TASR news agency. The ground firefighters are staying on site for the time being because they are manning the fireflex tanks from which the helicopters are pumping water in the inaccessible terrain. All tanks have been secured and manned by Slovak firefighters from the start. According to the Czech Minister of the Interior, Vít Rakušan, the situation is developing positively and one of the parts of the national park around the village of Janov has already been handed over to the park administration. Vladimír Vlček, director general of the Czech Fire and Rescue Service, said that even if they were unable to put out the fire by Friday, they would still drastically reduce the number of firefighters. However, the intervention will continue in the coming weeks as they have to continue monitoring the area, according to Vít Rakušan. The fire broke out in the national park in the north-west of the Czech Republic on 24 July. Firefighters managed to reduce the area of the fire to 154 hectares. About a thousand firefighters were on the scene on Monday.
Source: TASR
