The Junta de Andalucía has started emergency works for the regeneration of the area affected by the fire declared last July in the Sierra de Mijasan action that will have an investment of more than two million euros and that will take place in a public forest area of 612 hectares, as announced on Monday by the territorial delegate for Sustainability, Environment and Blue Economy, José Antonio Víquez.
This has been highlighted by the regional official in a visit he has made to the affected area accompanied by the mayor of Alhaurín el Grande, Toñí Ledesma, where he has valued “the speed with which the Andalusian Government has started the works of emergency”, which pursue prevent possible rains this fall from causing landslides, since in the case of occurring it could harm the future regeneration of the forest.
The emergency works will be carried out in the damaged areas of the municipalities of Alhaurín el Grande, Alhaurín de la Torre and Mijaswith an investment of more than two million euros in a public forest area of 612 hectares.
In the case of Sierra de Alhaurin el GrandeVíquez has reported that action is already being taken in an area that covers 287 hectares, with a investment close to 900,000 eurosand added that the performances will last for 9 months.
The second area affects 213.44 hectares of the public forest La Mezquita and Puerto Blanquillo, Alhaurín de la Torre, where an estimated maximum budget of 769,823.15 euros will be invested; while the third area of action, on 111.75 hectares in the municipality of Mijas in Sierra Blanca and Sierra Bermeja, it has a maximum execution budget of 385,255.46 euros.
The works will consist of performances ranging from the removal of burned trees, pest controlactions aimed at slowing down the processes of water erosion through the creation of stone walls or with remains of wood in small streams and fajines on the slopes, to the reforestation through seeding and planting of tree and shrub species.
The risk, which is what has endorsed the emergency declaration of workstakes on special significance right in the area of the fire, very prone to suffer torrential phenomena by the generation of isolated depressions in the high zones of the atmosphere (DANA), a phenomenon that can reach causing serious damage to people and infrastructure.
For her part, the mayor of Alhaurín el Grande, Toñi Ledesma, has expressed satisfaction with the fact that that barely a month and a half after the fire the emergency works have already started, at the same time that he highlighted “the speed and interest of the Andalusian Government for acting to guarantee the future of our mountains”.
The Sierra de Mijas forest fire started at noon on July 15 last in the place known as El Higuerónalthough finally affected the municipalities of Mijas, Alhaurín el Grande and Alhaurín de la Torre, and that due to the meteorological circumstances such as the changing wind, the steep orography and the abundant vegetation, the fire acquired a great virulence.
The proximity to the inhabited nuclei entailed the activation of level 1 of the Emergency Plan for Forest Fires and, only after several days of extinction, which required the participation of a significant amount of human resources and aerial means, the fire was controlled on July 19 and extinguished on August 3.