Oeiras, Portugal, July 29, 2025 (Lusa) - Portugal's minister for Home Affairs said on Tuesday that the number of firefighting aircraft was irrelevant, since what is causing "difficulty for the operatives" in the ongoing fires is the characteristics of the terrain.
As she left a meeting at the headquarters of the National Emergency and Civil Protection Authority (ANEPC) in Oeiras, Maria Lúcia Amaral emphasised that, looking at the fires that most afflict the authorities at the moment, "the existence of 72 or 76 or 80 aircraft" would be irrelevant, "because what causes difficulty for the operatives is the extremely accidental nature of the terrain, the difficulty of access".
"The complexity of the operations and the battle is such that it doesn't help to know how many aircraft we have, whether there are too many or not. And there are plenty," she added.
According to the minister, there are currently 72 aircreft "immediately available".
Asked what has failed in the fight against the fires, Maria Lúcia Amaral replied that "what fails, fails".
"We didn't want this to happen in our country, just as we didn't want it to happen in the rest of southern Europe. The fact is that it is happening," he said, maintaining that what needs to be understood "is the root cause of these fires".
Warning that everyone must contribute to preventing them from happening, the minister called on the population to change "ancestral practices", such as burning to protect their homes from fires.
Maria Lúcia Amaral also warned that, for example, in the Arouca fire, which is worrying the authorities, there are images of fireworks in the background when the fire started.
Today's meeting with the president of ANEPC, José Manuel Moura, was also attended by the prime minister, who also called for "everyone's collaboration" in the fight against the fires.
"This is everyone's fight, which needs everyone's co-operation and, to that end, we must all follow the guidelines that the authorities are issuing," said Luís Montenegro, assuring that the entire fire-fighting system is "currently on standby".
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