On the 17th and 18th November, within the scope of the Life Landscape Fire project, practical training and accreditation sessions were held for Prescribed Fire Technicians and Burn Operators.
These training sessions were attended by the trainees of the Prescribed Fire Technician Course (25 trainees – CIM technicians, municipality technicians and UEPS (GNR) agents), as well as some of the trainees of the Burn Operators Course (16 trainees from the Volunteer and Sapper Fire Brigades of Viseu and the Volunteer Fire Brigades of Vila Nova de Paiva).
These sessions were held in the locality of Ameixiosa, and the localities of Covas do Rio and S. Martinho das Moitas (São Pedro do Sul municipality). Their aim was to provide the territory’s civil protection agents with tools that will enable them to draw up prescribed burning plans and execute ignition techniques for prescribed burning, as well as the subsequent evaluation of the impacts of the burning.
Prescribed burning allows, in comparison with other vegetation management techniques, to achieve various objectives: silvicultural, silvopastoral, hunting and ecological. This is of great importance to prevent fires, as it reduces the area annually affected by fires by keeping forest fuel loads below critical levels.
