Blaze under control between the villages of Choirokitia and Vavla (update)

A large fire between the villages of Choirokitia and Vavla has been deemed manageable by authorities on Wednesday.

The blaze was reported to have begun just after 2pm and brought under control around 7:20pm, while the entire forestry department force had been called to the scene.

According to the department, 16 large firefighting vehicles are in the area, along with two medium sized ones, four bulldozers, and four water tanker trucks.

Around 90 firefighters were at the scene, while the two airplanes from the department also worked to put out the blaze, along with two aircraft from the fire services, and one from the police.

In a post, the fire services’ spokesman Andreas Kettis stated: “Our ground forces with a total of four fire engines from Limassol are heading to a fire, which occurred in dry grass and low wild vegetation.”

He added that another four fire engines from the forestry department and 2 from the game fund are in the area, along with four aircraft.

The forces were reinforced with additional fire engines from Limassol and Nicosia.

Individual livestock farms and individual residences were protected by the firefighting forces. The civil defence and organised volunteer groups have also been informed and are responding with their teams.

Meanwhile, speaking to CNA the mukhtar of Tochni Pantelis Charalambous said that the fire started in their village area and then spread towards Choirokitia, due to the strong winds.

As he stated, “we made it, I think the fire is under control.”

Citing some information, he said that at first glance it seems that the fire was arson.

In an announcement later in the day, the authorities said that some small areas remained that needed to be extinguished.

The fire services were going to remain in the area during the night to finishing extinguishing the blaze, which burned around 1 to 1.5 square kilometres.

Agriculture Minister Petros Xenofontos said that all cooperating forces worked perfectly to extinguish the fire in the villages of Tochni, Vavla and Choirokoitia, after visiting the area.

“Today, here in the field I have seen and found that both on the operational and administrative side all the cooperating forces worked flawlessly in a very dangerous environment, a very difficult fire and I want to thank them for the success of extinguishing it,” he said.