MACEDONIA O
T
he summer of 2021 was one of the worst in decades when it comes to open space fires that are devastating land, forests, houses, and tourist accommodations not only in Turkey and Greece but also in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, and Serbia. During July and August 2021, all of these Balkan nations suffered hundreds of injured people and, unfortunately, some even lost their lives in the fires. One of the main reasons for this was that the Balkan governments seemed to pay very little or almost no attention to the civil protection systems. As a result, the budgets to build, maintain, and constantly upgrade the capability and capacity to quickly and effectively fight summer wildfires were extremely limited. The most important means of fighting wildfires in a very early stage, before they turn into national or even international disasters, are appropriately equipped
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and available aircraft and helicopters. In addition, most of the few airtankers and helicopters in the Balkan nations' inventory were, and still are, in very poor condition. In the case of Macedonia, for example, all of its three highly-capable Air Tractor AT-802A Fire Boss amphibian fire bombers were grounded in the middle of the summer. This put the citizens, properties, and forests in very great danger. Virtually overnight, a nation that had excelled at fighting wildfires on its own for decades thus had to turn to the international community for aerial firefighting support. From national celebration to the state of crisis The "Day of the Republic" or simply "Ilinden" is a major national holiday of Macedonia that on 2 August
Macedonian Air Tractor AT-802A Fire Boss aircraft. Photo Dragan Cvetic via Igor Bozinovski
