FOUR members of the Armed Forces emergency response unit asked for the bill at café Terraza Carambola after a well-earned stop for coffee and toast – and found it full of zeroes.
At the foot of their receipt, two new entries had been added after their drinks and snacks – one reading 'heroes without capes' and, directly underneath, the other, 'thank you!'
It did not take long before a photograph of the above – posted on Twitter by Javier Castro (@JAVIERCASTRO96) – went viral, gaining 16,000 'likes' and 4,100 comments within a matter of hours.
The four Military Emergency Unit (UME) workers who sat at table 207 in the café in Los Llanos de Aridane on the Canarian island of La Palma at 11.20, ordering three milky coffees and two toasted open baguettes, one with Serrano ham and tomato and another with avocado, had been working round the clock battling a huge inferno that had already led to six roads being closed and 300 residents being evacuated in Garafía.
It was still not completely under control on the day the 'capeless heroes' got their free elevenses, and would take at least another two days, half a million litres of water, 11 aircraft, 120 UME members, and 40 forestry brigade workers from as far away as Soria (Castilla y León) and Toledo (Castilla-La Mancha), plus at least another 250 firefighters on the ground and in the air.
By the time it was reduced to smouldering ground that only needed day-and-night monitoring and drenching to stop it sparking up again, it had destroyed 1,977 acres of countryside.
But nobody was hurt and no properties were damaged.
It was not the worst fire La Palma has experienced; in summer 2016, a blaze that wiped out 6.8% of the island's land reduced over 12,000 acres to ashes.
Fortunately, emergency fire units and response procedures are geared up to these situations and a team on the ground and in the air is normally tackling a blaze within minutes, aiming initially to keep it contained and as far away as possible from residential areas.
La Palma residents were so delighted with Terraza Carambola's gesture towards those who had grappled tirelessly with the flames to keep them all safe that they have been flocking to the café en masse.
The owner, who opted to waive the bill, and waitress Natalia, had not given it a second thought – both decided automatically ran up a zero receipt from the till as it would never have occurred to them to charge people who had been brought in to save the island and protect its people – and they did not expect a photograph of the bill to make its way round the world on social media.
Islanders say this is an example of the 'good heart' and 'great people' who live in the Canary Islands and Spain as a whole, and to reward the café for its solidarity, have been travelling purposely to Los Llanos de Aridane to pay it a visit.
The café has been overwhelmed with customers in the last week as a result.
