The Xunta had to withdraw this summer 2,639 self-rescuers that it had distributed among the forest firefighters as part of their safety equipment. These are protective devices that generate oxygen so that the firefighter can breathe in case they find themselves in an emergency or entrapment situation. The faults, which have affected the vast majority of the 2,820 self-rescuers purchased by the Galician Government, were admitted this Friday in the regional Parliament by the Director General of Forest Defense, Manuel Francisco Gutiérrez, in response to a question from the PSdeG-PSOE.
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Gutiérrez explained that the self-rescuers delivered to the firefighters had to be withdrawn because they have aluminized airtight bags that inflated. The official from Alfonso Rueda’s Government pointed out that the devices “were sent to the manufacturer for review and replacement” as a “preventive measure,” as the firefighters reported the faults. Gutiérrez defended that the company that sold them assured them that this defect does not mean that the self-rescuers were “inoperative.” “We have to trust what the manufacturer says,” he opined.
The Director General of Forest Defense of the Xunta downplayed these “incidents.” “It does not mean that that number of professionals were simultaneously left without self-rescuers,” he emphasized regarding the figure of 2,639 devices withdrawn. The “preventive” replacements were made “progressively and individually,” “as the incidents were reported,” he argued.
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The socialist deputy Carmen Rodríguez Dacosta considers the distribution of this defective material to the forest firefighters “unforgivable.” Dacosta asked the Director General of Forest Defense if during the massive withdrawal of the devices there were firefighters who went to extinguish fires without self-rescuers. Faced with Gutiérrez’s vague response, the PSdeG representative accused the Xunta of taking “no” measures to avoid that risk situation “or at least, very insufficient ones.”
Dacosta denounced that members of the firefighting team have told her about more deficiencies and delays in receiving the material. She stated that it is the workers themselves who have to acquire the backpacks to be able to carry all the equipment. Gutiérrez responded that they are already “being purchased.”
