Lommel (Brussels Morning Newspaper) – A major emergency drill at Centre Parcs De Vossemeren in Lommel today, June 17, 2025, simulates a health fire evacuation. About 75 extras, 3,200 guests, firefighters, and police (with a helicopter) participate.
As VRT news reported, Today, June 17, 2025, between 12:00 and 16:00, in Lommel, in the province of Limburg, Belgium, Centre Parcs De Vossemeren will be the scene of a large-scale emergency drill, so people might see many emergency vehicles.
This isn’t a real emergency, but a practice exercise. The drill simulates a scenario where a heath fire in the Blekerheide nature reserve spreads towards the park’s forested areas and holiday homes.
Local authorities, emergency services and park staff will be involved in order to test their response to such a threat. There will be practices around evacuating people and extending responses to the fire by the park’s internal emergency plan. They mentioned their goal was to conduct the exercise for realistic training, giving everyone the best preparation for a possible real-life situation.
What happens if a wildfire spreads to Centre Parcs Lommel?
The drill happening at Centre Parcs De Vossemeren is in response to recent fires, showing how quickly fires can spread. According to officials, the goal is to make sure everyone can work together quickly if a real fire happens. They’ll practice how to talk to each other, make quick decisions, and get people out safely.
“By practising in practice, we test whether our emergency and communication plans work, whether the systems function smoothly, and especially how well all the services involved are coordinated,” the city of Lommel said.
The major emergency drill at Centre Parcs De Vossemeren this afternoon includes a full evacuation of the holiday park. The scenario involves a rapidly spreading health fire reaching the park, necessitating the safe and orderly evacuation of all guests and staff. To make the exercise as realistic as possible, 75 people are participating as extras, acting as evacuees and injured persons.
These volunteers can include resident volunteers from the Lommel residential care centre, and college students, all playing different roles to create the chaos and uncertainty of a real emergency. Officials stated this allows the fire brigade, police and ambulance services to practice their response procedures as well as interaction with people experiencing distress.
Firefighters are involved in this alongside a police helicopter that is practising its water-dropping procedures. Officials mentioned that in case matching required by the work from responding agencies, this provided a safe chance to practice their incident coordination in an environment. Guests were notified and understood the situation; therefore, they could enjoy the day.
A large portion of the park was already vacant due to the Graspop metal festival, with around 3,200 visitors attending, and those empty homes are now part of the simulated evacuation zone. The city of Lommel is advising the public to avoid the area to allow emergency services to operate without obstruction.
