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Canada requests a third deployment of Mexican firefighters
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251 so far, the largest international deployment in the history of Mexico
A third group of 41 Mexican wild fire firefighters will travel this week to the British Columbia, Canada, to support in extinguishing the fires.
With this deployment the total of firefighters aiding in this task amounts to 251, the largest international mobilisation in the history of Mexico.
The Mexican National Forestry Commission (CONAFOR) firefighters come from 13 different entities, the governments of Baja California and Jalisco, and from the Civil Protection Units of Zapopan and Talpa, Jalisco.
According to the Wild Fires Management Administration of the CONAFOR, this past weekend the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre (CIFFC) requested an additional number of firefighters that will join the ones already deployed in the area and that had travelled to Canada on the first and second week of August.
The wildfires specialists have already been transferred to the national headquarters of CONAFOR in Jalisco where they are awaiting examinations and instructions.
3, 906 firefighters from New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Mexico have joined the fight against 143,000 fires in the British Columbia.
The Mexican team has participated over the past 2 weeks in wild fire operational and planning tasks in the different camps distributed around the British Columbia.
The tasks to which they are assigned to demand the use of specialised tools and machinery as well as air operations knowledge.
This support is part of the Memorandum of Understanding for the Exchange of Wildfire Management Resources that was signed between the CONAFOR and the CIFFC in January 2016.