A professional firefighter was very seriously injured by a bullet on Sunday while responders attended vehicle fires in the Plan de Campagne commercial zone in Les Pennes-Mirabeau, near Marseille. The firefighter, an adjudant-chef with the departmental fire and rescue service who commanded the operation, was taken to the emergency department at North Hospital, the fire service said. Another firefighter was targeted and a vehicle was struck during the attack.
Jacques Witkowski, the prefect of Bouches-du-Rhône, told Agence France-Presse that emergency crews had been called late in the afternoon to extinguish a fire involving a heavy truck and light vehicles when they were fired upon. He said the man attacked them with a hunting-type rifle and had probably set the vehicles on fire himself.
After the shooting, the assailant barricaded himself in an illegal dwelling, a nearby caravan, according to Romain Amaro, the Les Républicains mayor of Les Pennes-Mirabeau, who went to the scene. Amaro said there was a large police and gendarmerie presence in the commercial zone, organized by the prefect in connection with demonstrations, which allowed officers to intervene very quickly. The prefect said the suspect was arrested and was being handed over to judicial police.
Before the arrest was announced, Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez wrote on X that the injured firefighter had been taken into care and expressed thoughts for his recovery, condemning what he described as a gratuitous and violent attack on firefighters. Eric Brocardi, a spokesperson for French firefighters, offered support to his colleague, his relatives and the teams mobilized, saying on X that when those who provide rescue become targets, the republican pact is affected, and that rescue work must never put responders in danger.
Sources: Le Monde.