Israel sending team of 5 fire protection experts to help with LA fires

The Fire and Rescue Authority will send a team of five fire protection experts to the United States this evening, to help responders combat the blazes now sweeping southern California, says the agency’s spokeswoman.

The delegation will include experts employed by the department including Dr. Shai Levy, who specializes in forest fire prevention, and Avi Ben-Zaken, operations director in the South District. They will remain in the US for around a week.

“We have had wildfires already in Israel, perhaps not of the size over there [in California] but still, we have had quite big ones,” says spokeswoman Tal Volvovitch. “We are now seeing, outside Israel, the sheer damage that fire can cause and the power it has.”

In 2016, a wave of devastating wildfires leveled some 600 homes in the northern city of Haifa, Volvovitch recalls to The Times of Israel. Many of the experts on the delegation have experience combating these large-scale blazes, making them well-equipped to assist the West Coast state.

Like Israel, California is located in a “Mediterranean” climate, characterized by rainy winters and a hot, dry summer season that lends itself to recurring wildfires.

Earlier this week, Fire and Rescue Authority spokespeople told The Times of Israel it intended to send a symbolic team of a few dozen firefighters to the US West Coast, but the proposal has since been shelved in favor of the current plan.