One of the constant fears in the back of your mind, as a resident here in Benahavis, surrounded by Pine forests, is the ever-present danger of forest fires. Two years ago the whole town was evacuated one dramatic summer evening along with wailing sirens, urgent Police broadcasts as the cars drove around the streets telling residents in no uncertain terms to leave town immediately.
Ten minutes later we were crawling along the one road out of town with a massive 5 km queue of other residents doing the same: the dog an done of the cats were shoved in the back of the car along with a holdall full of important ID documents, insurance policies and pet food.
Panic almost set in_ being night-time we could see the orange glow just the other side of Monte Mayor as the fire swept closer to our homes. Luckily for us, we had an office in nearby San Pedro de Alcantara to bed down in, with a toilet to ourselves and a sofa which we dismantled into component cushions. Unfortunately the dog and cat decided it was ‘Cabaret time’ and jumped all over us for the whole night. Hairy German Shepherd arsehole in your face at 5 am is not likely to create an atmosphere of bonhommie the next day.
Neither was the ‘wait’ for news and constant scrolling on local social media. Trying to find out if we still had a house to go back to, possessions and indeed the second cat who ran away and hid and had to be left to her own devices.
Another sleepless night ingesting pet hair and scrabbling around on an office parquet floor beckoned until at about 12.30 am the following night the ‘all clear’ was announced on the Town Hall’s social media platform so we hastily retraced our steps. The fire had destroyed thousands of acres of natural pine forest and taken about 150 firefighters working in 30 degree plus heat, two aircraft and five helicopters all of three days to control, mercilessly still about 1km away from the town outskirts.
OUR learning points from this were to keep the emergency suitcase ready , with passports, ID, insurance policies and spare undies & wet wipes constantly ready – like having a permanently 39 week-pregnant wife about to drop at a moment’s notice. THE TOWN HALL’s learning points and the Andalucian governments- were to establish a permanently available forest fire task force to be deployed at short notice, a brilliant mobile app allowing anyone to submit photos of new outbreaks which magically passes the location onto the police and- even better – for the water company to manage the reservoir behind our town and keep it full all summer. It serves now as a top up point apparently for the fire and emergency services should vast amounts of water be needed.
It also creates a stunning natural beauty spot instead of a muddy cess pit as prior to this summer I’d only ever seen it 95% empty. So, every (fire) cloud has a silver lining and we now have a lovely beauty spot around which we can hike, walk the dogs or dump rubbish in , depending on your nationality.