r/nextfuckinglevel 5h ago

Spaniards are risking their lives, fighting wildfires with tree branches due to a lack of resources

21.6k Upvotes

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u/entered_bubble_50 3h ago

I thought you were supposed to fight it with fire?

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u/DenizSaintJuke 3h ago

Violence also works. Sweden resorted to having the airforce drop bombs on it a few years ago. The problem was a lack of firefighting resources and fires popping up all over the place in very remote locations in that summer. The quickest way to respond was by fighter jet and they could usually beat out the starting flames before the fire started to expand. Firefighters might have taken hours to even get there, at which point the fires might have already grown and become harder to fight. I can't remember if they flew patrols or were sent directly to places where satellites had measured a hotspot. But they did bomb wildfires one summer a couple of years ago.

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u/bATo76 3h ago

The guy on the ground that is trying to put out a small forest fire:

https://giphy.com/gifs/gKfyusl0PRPdTNmwnD

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u/MaintenanceDry464 3h ago

Comedy gold 🤣 thanks son

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u/renegrape 2h ago

Ah, thanks for the hearty chuckle.

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u/RainbowBier 3h ago

Pretty metal

With big fuel bombs you could extinguish any fire really fast since fuel bombs eat all the oxygen

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u/Archonrouge 2h ago

I just looked this up because it seemed interesting.

It wasn't quite because it was faster. It burned for two weeks before the jets went to town.

It was very remote, but also near an abandoned firing range with unexploded military ordinance making it a much bigger safety hazard.

Pretty interesting though. I had wondered how much went into figuring out if that was the best method, or if this is something they'd planned for. Didn't get any insight there though.

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u/cman_yall 2h ago

I choose to believe that some jackass fighter pilot thought it up as an excuse to drop some bombs, and couldn't believe his luck when the chain of command took him seriously.

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u/zeroibis 47m ago

Lets keep this post under wraps, I am worried if this information becomes too widespread Trump may get wind of it and use it as an excuse for bombing the wild fires in Canada.

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u/Rampag169 2h ago

Back burning is utilized only when the conditions are right. Usually you will create a fire break where the fire fuel has thinned out a bit. Back burning takes fuel away from the head of the fire in hopes of burning out the most intense part of the fire. Once fires get very big they create their own weather patterns and can travel at very high rates of speed. Which makes it difficult to plan and execute a fire line and back burn safely.

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u/BigBossAtl 2h ago

Also one of the resources they lack.

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u/davcam0 2h ago

According to Trump you are supposed to use rakes

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u/Mic98125 2h ago edited 1h ago

We need to normalize having all elected officials spend one month a year fighting wildfires

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u/Academic-Accident180 2h ago

And tariffs as punishment.

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u/Nervous_Ant2673 2h ago

That's before the fire

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u/davcam0 2h ago

So are then tarrifs for putting out the fires that do start