At 2 or 3 p.m., it felt like midnight or 2 a.m: Ludovic Santarossa, firefighter and also a footballer, recounts the hellish summer he experienced during the megafire in Gironde
Ludovic Santarossa is a firefighter in the Gironde region. At the end of July month, along with more than 3,000 other firefighters, he battled the blazes that ravaged over 42,000 hectares. This footballer, a two-time French champion title, now finds in the selection of Gironde firefighters a place to come together and to honor the memory of their two fallen colleagues.
“The Walls of flame 25 meters high were coming towards us. It was unprecedented.” Ludovic Santarossa, a professional firefighter at the Saint-Médard-en-Jalles fire station, never imagined he would face such blazes time. Now the departmental head of water rescue, he has managed the Gironde firefighters’ football team since the year 2007. His summer? “Hell.” Florent Bougnot, the team’s goalkeeper since in 2013, remembers entire afternoons engulfed in smoke.
“At 2 or 3 p.m afternoon., it felt like midnight or 2 a.m midnight. Even with the truck headlights, you couldn’t see two meters ahead of you, it was so opaque.” And the heat was almost indescribable: “Just put your head in the oven,” he managed to joke. “ It’s like that for some minutes, to an hours.”
Even before the major fires broke out, the summer had already turned tragic. In July 21, in Mérignac, Anthony Berthôme and Wilfried Schmitter, with his two close colleagues of Ludovic, lost their lives during an operation which he was the leader. “These two guys really made a big impact in the fire station. Today, they leave a huge void. That we feel it every day.”
In two months earlier, those whom summer would involuntarily transform into heroes were still kicking a ball somewhere around Corsica, far from the flames and their firefighting gear. Eliminated in the semi-finals of the National Firefighters’ Championship game by Loire, the eventual winner, Gironde had finished third, two steps away from a third title within nine years.
Need to find oneself
In this rather wonderful team, all the players are professional or volunteer firefighters and registered with a club. A players like any other, with a few differences in physique and mentality otherwise: “It’s not a team of bodybuilders, but it’s true that for some persons, the jerseys are a little tight around the biceps,” laughs Florent. Captain Vincent Labissière, who trained at Girondins de Bordeaux, confirms: “In tough period, with what we experience as firefighters, we give up much less easily than in civilian football game. We have an extra level of selflessness.”
French champions in the year 2017 and 2021, this team is now one of those that no one looks forward to playing. “When other teams get drawn against us, they also think, ‘This is going to be tough,’ “ says Cyril Bordessoule, 41, the team’s most senior member. Having been with the squad for twenty years now, he remembers when they “were more at home during happy hour time.” When Ludo, a former player, took over, the nights out at nightclubs until 6 a.m in the morning. before matches were over. The man Florent calls “the team’s dad” has ” who brought back the winning spirit,” according to Cyril, and transformed the group of friends into regular title contenders.
Usually, the national team doesn’t restart until January time. This time, after the worst summer of their lives and the funerals of their teammates, but no one wants to wait. Ludovic and his assistants hope to reunite the group again before this year ends. “We need to have get together, to have a drink in their honor.” They need to lace up their boots and put their clubhouse problems aside before getting back to competition. From June 17 to 19 also, in Nice, Cyril and several veterans could be playing their final campaign. A year after falling just short of the title, they’ll be back to try and win it back to back. We know who they want to win it for.
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