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Fire, lava, snow, viruses... For a couple of years the world has sounded like a fire station.

Are there more plagues than normal or is there more media focus on them? There have always been natural emergencies, but it is true that we have had a streak with some of a less common nature: the pandemic, the La Palma volcano, the Filomena in Madrid. ...And this year, a hot summer.

How many fires has the UME had to put out? Since June, my battalion has intervened in 18 forest fires, an extraordinary situation, really.

In total, there have been more, of course, because we have already had two heat waves, the first in the north and the second that has hit the west, Extremadura, Castilla León, Galicia.

It is not normal to have so many, and all at once.

They have forced the deployment of more than a thousand troops from the UME. You have been in the front line in several.

Which has been the worst? I was in Casas de Miravete and Jerte, both in Extremadura, and in Cebreros, in Ávila.

Perhaps the hardest was the first, because two towns had to be evacuated and the intensity of the flames created more complicated conditions. The UME enters places from which everyone runs away.

It must not be easy to live chaining emergencies.

How is it done? You have to prepare to face all kinds of natural disasters - from floods to earthquakes - in which you work under stress, so you have to acquire not only physical and technical resources, but also psychological ones.

You have to know the material to use it effectively and train with physical activities such as races, 'crossfit', intensity or resistance exercises... And learn to calmly face new situations.

The pandemic, for example, which was a major challenge. How do you clamp your brain to be able to control it when all hell breaks loose around you? Well, there is the experience, which makes you gain psychological strength, and, also, we have a cabinet in the UME that trains us to deal with this type of situation.

And, in the end, it also helps a lot to work together, as a family.

Fellowship makes you strong, leaning on others keeps you morale high. You'll also have to play psychologists yourselves, I imagine.

What do you say to someone who is being hit by a lava flow? That's why we receive psychological training, to know how to talk to people in such a situation.

Whenever we go somewhere, something bad has happened, people are suffering, they have lost their homes, they have lost everything.

It is important to give them emotional support.

It is not easy to face these situations, you have to have a lot of empathy. For this job, I guess you have to be resilient as standard.

What kind of character do you have to have to work at the UME? The values ​​are common to the rest of the armed forces, sacrifice, dedication... And normally we are disciplined people, the unit is hierarchical and that makes the internal operation efficient .

We are also active people, of course, we like to be on the move. What personal toll does such intense work have? Well, sometimes it's complicated for families because we need a lot of availability. How many days can you spend away from home? About 200, between interventions, exercises , maneuvers courses... It is not only the intervention itself, but all the preparation.

You were experienced in fighting visible enemies: fire, ice, runaway water in a flood... What was it like fighting an invisible virus? At first we had a lot of uncertainty, like everyone else, and we had to go evolving based on the information that came to us from the experts.

That did have quite a psychological impact on the staff, but hey, we knew we had to be there and we also felt supported by society.

The work was not easy, but it was rewarding. Is it difficult to get the images of catastrophes out of your head? Some of them are more ingrained in your brain, but the preparation we have talked about makes you calm.

The safety of the people at a time like this depends largely on us.

I remember an image from the news during the snowfall of Filomena in Madrid in which the UME came to attend to some drivers lying on an icy road.

They looked at them a bit like a guardian angel. People usually receive us very well, and they help us a lot because they know that many times we are working until we are exhausted.

They even supply us with what they can when we are doing an intervention.

The truth is that it fills you with pride to be able to help them. Then there is the other side of the coin, the criticism about the slow deployment.

How do they fall? In the end, we do not deploy late, but when we are required, and there is a protocol for activating state elements when the autonomous community requests that intervention, which is when the emergency goes to level 2.

We have personnel permanently on duty at the base and, as soon as that activation order arrives, a reconnaissance element comes out in 15 minutes.

In an hour, the first elements of intervention, and in four we are able to deploy to any point on the Peninsula. Do you sleep with your boots on? There are alert shifts, with personnel who are 24 hours a day ready with the vehicles and appropriate means according to the time of year.

Boots and uniform are put on in a minute. Are there enough resources for the unit? I think so, so far we haven't had any problems.

And, furthermore, we are not alone in an emergency;

There are other resources of the Army and the Air Force. Are the Spanish soldiers paid worse than in Europe, as it is written there? I don't know, really.

Say goodbye with the most rewarding moment in your career. They are all because of the response of the people.

I work at UME because I like what I do.

I could be in another unit, but I've been here eight years because I really like going out there to help people.

It is what fills me and makes me feel proud.

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  • EMU

  • Estremadura

  • Galicia

  • Avila

  • Fires

  • Galicia fires

  • floods

  • Articles Fatima Ruiz