Into The Fire

The Mistral, drought and arsonists… an explosive cocktail in Marseille.A fire has just broken out behind the Marseille Aix University in Luminy. This first outbreak poses a direct threat to the Calanques (creeks) nature reserve, one of the jewels of France’s patrimony

In Marseille, on July 14, the housing projects come alive and organize firework displays one after the other. This is the night chosen by arsonists to put on their own little shows, in which the marine firefighters are the principal actors

The firefighters of the Saint Pierre firehouse, one of the busiest in Marseille, are called to a fire in an apartment in a block of several floors. Meantime a pleasure boat and its passengers are drifting towards the jagged rocks of the calanques. To make things worse… the Mistral is forecast to blow

The GRIMP, the dangerous situation reconnaissance and intervention group, operate day and night in the calanques national park. This is one of the most beautiful of France’s nature parks. But this paradise can sometimes turn into a nightmare. The Pointe Rouge team attends one emergency for a tourist who’s lost consciousness on a totally inaccessible beach.

August 12 2016, a 50’ schooner runs onto a rock in the Frioul archipelago, several miles off the Marseille shores. The Pointe Rouge rescue services do all they can to prevent the ship from sinking… All passengers are taken off in time and the rescuers do all they can to run the boat onto the nearest beach, but the breach is too big…

The firefighters are in the front line to cap broken gas lines. This sort of intervention can quickly turn to tragedy. In summer, the Marseille calanques park is a trap. The GRIMP is on constant alert. Lots of tourists get trapped in the maze of rocks and put themselves in danger once they move off the beaten tracks. Divers from the specialist Operations Section, SOS Aqua, are regularly called out to emergencies at the old port. These interventions take place in one of the oldest sites of this ancient city. The rescuers often find themselves faced with archeological, and sometimes dangerous, adventures.