Germany's unseasonal wildfire risk has prompted fire brigades to call for military helicopters to be kept on standby for water dousing. Forest blazes have already occurred in springtime Europe.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/M. Assanimoghaddam
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President of the Fire Brigades' Federation (DFV) Hartmut Ziebs said only the army's Sikorsky CH-53 transporters were capable of airlifting 5,000-liter refillable water canisters that may be needed if Europe's 2019 summer causes wildfires.
"The fire brigades in Germany must have access to at least ten more fire-fighting helicopters," said Ziebs.
Germany allows local fire-fighters to request federal and regional state assistance, including the provision of police and military vehicles, in the case of major emergencies.
But there may not be enough helicopters available.
"Using the rotation principle, it must be possible to deploy at least three helicopters simultaneously at three major emergency scenes across Germany," said Ziebs.
The DFV does not have its own special wildfire-extinguishing aircraft that are commonly seen tackling wildfires in northern America or southern Europe.
Dousing at Dreetz, Brandenburg state on TuesdayImage: picture alliance/dpa/C. Pörschmann
On Wednesday, firefighters were trying to contain a cliff-face forest blaze near Saalfeld in eastern Thuringia state. Near Hamburg on Tuesday, crews doused a fire on a nature reserve.
In southern Sweden and southwestern Norway, where risks are also high, crews in recent days have also fought fires on hundreds of hectares.
Extra funds, special vehicles
Responding to the appeal from the DFV, Germany's Interior Ministry said the Federal Police had 12 Puma helicopters. But they are only able to lift 2,000-liter water dousing units.
Federal authorities also had 400 special vehicles, each capable of pumping water over a distance of two kilometers, the ministry said. It stressed that under Germany's federal system firefighting was the responsibility of communal authorities, not central government.
Parliament had, however, allocated an extra €100 million ($111 million) from 2019 to 2022 for fire-fighting and disaster protection, a ministry spokeswoman said.
Germany's Defense Ministry said one of its Bundeswehr helicopters (pictured above) had helped dampen a moorland blaze near the northern town of Goldenstedt in Lower Saxony.
Vulnerable vegetation
DWD agricultural meteorologist Udo Busch said conditions after the winter in many regions of Germany were "significantly worse in 2019 compared to the previous year."
Farmers in Brandenburg, the state that encircles Berlin, are already worried about their harvests.
"We're hoping ardently for rain; the deciding month for us is May," said regional farmers' federation spokesman Tino Erstling. He added that if the weather, which is normally changeable in April, stayed mostly dry, then cereal plants would hardly be able to mature into productive grain heads.
Large-scale monoculture forestry plants will "fail medium-term," said Pierre Ibisch, professor for forestry and eco-system management at the Eberswalde University for Sustainable Development, in Brandenburg state, north of Berlin.
Instead, "forests of the future" would be made up of deciduous trees in a rich mix as they do not dry out so intensely, Ibisch said. They also dry out less rapidly compared to pine needle forests.
Bark beetles
The widespread presence of bark beetles that left pine trees dead and bark peeling had the potential in the coming European summer — as it did in 2018 — to allow uncontrollable forest fires to ignite, said Karlheinz Busen, forestry spokesman for the opposition liberal Free Democrats.
The federal and regional state governments must take the current warnings seriously, he said
ipj/jm (dpa, AFP)
Forests can take decades to recover from fire
Wildfires and logging are systematically ravaging the world's forests. While some loss makes way for regeneration, scientists warn that woodland takes a painfully long time to really recover.
Image: Getty Images/A. Renneisen
World Heritage sites at risk
Devastating fires raging through the World Heritage-listed Mount Kenya National Park this month have destroyed more than 80,000 hectares — almost half of the site. Fires here aren't uncommon, but this year alone more than 100 have been reported, with many of them severe. The second tallest mountain in Africa is home to lakes, dense forest, glaciers and rare animals, all of which are at risk.
Image: Getty Images/A. Renneisen
Buried underneath a blackened surface
As Greece gradually comes to terms with the wildfires that left 80 people dead last summer, researchers from the Australian National University (ANU) have found that forests themselves need a long time to recover from such a devastating blaze. Scientists are only just beginning to understand how and to what extent fires affect life below the forest floor.
Image: Getty Images/AFP/S. Karmaniolas
Soil takes decades, even centuries to recover
In a recent study, Australian scientists found that it takes as long as 80 years after a wildfire and 30 years after logging for forest soils to fully recover. Working in more than 80 locations in southeast Australia, researchers tested over 700 soil samples that had suffered nine different types of damage – including wildfires, clearcutting and post-fire salvage logging.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/P. Pleul
Six months on
Six months after a forest fire struck an area southwest of Berlin in summer 2018, large sections of the affected land have been cleared away. Many of the remaining trees are blackened. Scientists believe that besides the wildfires themselves, post-fire clearing can cause the loss of key soil nutrients and have long-lasting impacts on forest soils.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/P. Pleul
Human intervention disrupts natural cycles
In many places, wildfires are an important part of a natural cycle. Some trees, like the eucalyptus, even need fire to release their seeds. Post-fire ash can actually inject large amounts of nutrients into the soil immediately after a fire, scientists say. But there can be too much of a good thing, and extended droughts, logging and fire suppression can all disrupt natural cycles.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/M. Suslin
Ancient ecosystems razed to the ground
Portugal's 700 year-old Pinhal de Leiria forest was destroyed during the wildfires that swept across Europe in summer 2018. A staggering 80 percent of the forest – home to all manner of bugs, birds and mammals – was destroyed. Despite help from local volunteers, it could take as long as half a century for the soil to regenerate.
Image: picture-alliance
Loss of vital nutrients
During a fire, soil temperatures can reach 500 degrees Celsius (932 degrees Fahrenheit), leading to a loss of growth-promoting nutrients, such as phosphorus, organic carbon and nitrate. When fires occur repeatedly in the same place, it's even harder for the forest floor to recover. Without these nutrients, soils are unable to support plant growth or store carbon.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/R. Lehti
No soil, no life
Soils are a vital part of forest ecology. They are the basis of almost all terrestrial life, scientists point out – influencing plant growth and survival, nurturing communities of beneficial fungi and bacteria, and cycles of key nutrients. They also store enormous amounts of carbon.
Image: picture-alliance/F. Herrmann
Not just fire
It's not just excessive fires that disrupt soil composition. Clearing forests with machinery and burning the remaining debris also has an impact. Logging can expose the forest floor, compact the soil and deplete its nutrients, as well as release a lot of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/P. Pleul
More hot years to come
Germany's Treuenbrietzen forest is a shadow of its former glory. Most of the remaining trees are ashen skeletons, and the forest floor is blackened. It faces an enormous struggle to regenerate. And given the predicted increase in the number, frequency and intensity of wildfires prompted by drought, it could be another lifetime before the seeds of restoration emerge.
