Dassault Moves Sensitive Equipment Off Two Gironde Sites and ArianeGroup Evacuates Saint-Médard-en-Jalles at 42,000 Hectares Burned
Bordeaux, 30 July 2026
Key points
- The fire that began on 22 July near Saumos, north-west of Bordeaux, burned some 42,000 hectares and prompted the preventive evacuation of some 220,000 people across 23 communes over the eight days, on préfecture figures, 55,000 of them on the night of 29–30 July
- Dassault Aviation, coordinating with the Direction générale de l'armement and the préfecture, moved sensitive items of equipment out of its Martignas-sur-Jalle plant and its Cestas logistics centre to the Mérignac site and to Air Base 106; work on the Rafale final assembly line was interrupted
- ArianeGroup evacuated its Gironde sites, including Saint-Médard-en-Jalles, where solid propellant is loaded for the M51 submarine-launched ballistic missile; Roxel's principal solid-rocket-motor plant and Airbus Atlantic sites lie inside the same perimeter
- Some 1,500 soldiers were deployed and firebreaks cut around what the préfète called sensitive sites; on 30 July evacuation orders were lifted for Saint-Médard-en-Jalles, Martignas-sur-Jalle and Saint-Aubin-de-Médoc
A forest fire west of Bordeaux forced France to evacuate the propellant complex that loads the M51 submarine-launched ballistic missile and to move sensitive equipment off two Dassault sites under armament-directorate coordination — an eight-day emergency inside the industrial base of the French deterrent.
The measures were precautionary and were described as such. Dassault's transfers went to hardened alternatives a short distance away — the Mérignac site and Air Base 106 — rather than out of the département, and ArianeGroup's evacuation was of personnel and operations, not of stock. The préfecture's daily situation reports through the week list the camp de Souge military training area among the overnight flare-up zones, and aerial retardant drops were flown over it on 28 July. Firebreaks were cut around the propellant and motor sites before the 41-degree heat spike arrived on 29 July.
By 30 July the préfecture had lifted the evacuation orders covering the three communes that host most of the affected industry. Neither Dassault nor ArianeGroup had issued a restart statement at that point, and no damage to production infrastructure had been reported by either.
What the week exposed is siting, not fire management. M51 propellant loading, Roxel's principal motor plant and Rafale final assembly sit within a few kilometres of each other inside a maritime pine forest, and there is no second loading site for the deterrent to fall back on. The mitigation available across eight days was to cut firebreaks and drive equipment one perimeter over — to Mérignac and Air Base 106, both inside the same département. Signal No. 112 covered the emergency as it ran, No. 113 its stand-down. France has spent the year arguing for European strategic autonomy on the strength of an industrial base it has never had to disperse.
