THE WEATHER
See page 2 for the week´s forecast
www.thecourier.es
Edition 341
Friday 29th September 2017
GUARDAMAR’S BIG BLAZE T
wo hectares of woodland was destroyed in a blaze deliberately started in the Playa Babilonia area of Guardamar on Monday afternoon. Guardamar’s mayor José Luis Sáez said that an arsonist caused the fire, which was reported at around 5.00pm. Crews were brought in from Almoradí, Orihuela and Torrevieja, to supplement the forest brigades based in Guardamar and Tibi.
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It took crews four hours to bring the blaze under control, which was started in a protected area, with teams working through the night to make sure the fire did not restart. It was a busy day for fire tenders, as teams from Guardamar, Elche, and Crevillente also had to deal with a fire that burnt some six thousand square metres of canes off the Los Vaillos camino linking Catral to Dolores.
HIGH TECH COLLAR
martphone GPS technology was used to track down four violent robbers who broke into a property on the La Florida urbanisation on the Orihuela Costa. An unnamed couple, believed to be British, called the Orihuela local police after four men burst into their home, and stole mobile phones, jewellery, as well as some cash, which the authorities said was around 100 pounds. The woman was in state of shock when officers arrived, whilst her husband suffered an arm
injury as he bravely tried to stop the robbers from getting away. A number of patrol cars started a sweep of the area, whilst the couple were interviewed about their ordeal, as they provided the officers with a detailed description of the burglars. The clincher came though when the man told the police that there was GPS tracking enabled on the stolen smartphones, and he produced his computer tablet, which the crooks had not stolen, and the police noticed that
one of the phones was just 200 metres away. The police then decided to make a bee line for where the signal was coming from, and discovered four men hiding in some bushes, just metres away from the phones, which they had thrown away and smashed their screens. Unknown to them, one of the GPS trackers were still working. The gang (ages and nationalities undeclared) were arrested and made available to the Orihuela courts, whilst the couple's
property was returned to them.