By Janis Laizans and Guillermo Martinez
LANTON, France/EL TIEMBLO, Spain, July 29 (Reuters) – A major blaze in central Spain has stabilised, Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska said on Wednesday, in a rare reprieve as soaring temperatures in France and Spain increased the threat from wildfires in both countries.
Blazes have forced large-scale evacuations of people, scorched through forests and killed wildlife in Spain and France over the past days, and the minister had warned of “three tough days” ahead, with strong winds and high temperatures.
But Grande-Marlaska later said authorities had now lifted all evacuation and shelter-in-place orders in Avila province, though some curbs remained in parts of the Madrid area.
Authorities meanwhile warned of another fire in the northwestern Spanish province of Zamora. They issued an evacuation order for six towns and asked about 1,000 people to shelter in place.
Spain’s weather agency AEMET said temperatures were expected to reach 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) on Wednesday in at least six regions, which have been placed on orange alert, the second-highest level.
FIREFIGHTERS WARY OF NEW TEMPERATURE RISE
In France, temperatures in the southwest, hit by devastating fires, were expected to rise from around 33 C on Tuesday to peak at 42 C, according to Meteo France, while dry winds in the afternoon could stoke flames.
French firefighters kept a major blaze west of Bordeaux stable overnight. And near Bordeaux’s airport, which has remained open, tramway services resumed and hotels reopened.
But officials warned the wildfires were far from over. The municipality of Lege-Cap-Ferret flagged several flare-ups in the area, adding that firefighters had managed to stabilise them. BFM journalists also reported more flare-ups in the region.
“We remain vigilant of course today, considering the forecast weather conditions, with a new rise in temperatures and higher wind speeds in the afternoon,” firefighter commander Matthieu Jomain told reporters earlier in the day.
Meanwhile, the EU’s emergency response centre warned that Greece, Italy and Central Europe were also set to face a heightened wildfire risk in the coming weeks.
EVACUATIONS AND SHOCK AT RUINED HOMES
The impact on the forests has been widespread. The wildfire in the Landes area west of Bordeaux, a popular tourist destination, has devastated 42,000 hectares (104,000 acres) of mainly pine trees.
Authorities have evacuated about 220,000 people, including holidaymakers and local residents, as the fire threatened the Cap Ferret peninsula on the Atlantic coast, only accessible by one road.
Raphael Fohanno could not believe what had happened to his parents’ house in the small beach town of Biscarrosse, also hit by wildfires in southwestern France.
“It’s a shock, thinking that just an hour earlier I’d been in my room and everything and now, there’s nothing left,” 18-year-old Fohanno said. His parents and sister had been evacuated by helicopter while he was out of the house.
FIRE IN SPAIN’S CASTELLON RAGES FOR FIFTH DAY
From Thursday onwards, danger levels in southwestern France appear likely to decrease thanks to some thunderstorms, lower temperatures and increased humidity, but will remain high in the southeast, Meteo France said.
Four people were arrested in recent days in the area, one on suspicion of stealing jewellery from evacuated houses, two for allegedly stealing food from an evacuation centre in Bordeaux, and one for pretending to be a therapist and offering paid sessions to evacuees, police said.
While the situation had improved in the central provinces of Avila and Madrid, a blaze in eastern Castellon remained out of control after burning more than 10,000 hectares as weather conditions triggered several flare-ups.
Around 10,000 evacuated residents were still unable to return to their homes in Castellon. The fire’s perimeter is currently estimated at 75.5 km (47 miles), regional authorities said as the fire entered its fifth day on Wednesday.
DEER KILLED IN SPANISH FOREST
Europe, the world’s fastest-warming continent, has endured record-breaking heatwaves this year, as human-driven climate change is intensifying the heat and drought that allow wildfires to spread faster.
More frequent and intense heatwaves are causing thousands of excess deaths and increasingly disrupting everyday life, from snarling road and rail travel to hindering river shipping.
Highlighting the devastation on the countryside and wildlife, Reuters drone footage from El Tiemblo, in Spain’s Avila province, near Madrid, showed charred deer carcasses in a forest burnt to ashes.
A Madrid resident who gave her name as Cintia was horrified by the scene in El Tiemblo, a place she has often visited.
“We love this, the wildlife, everything around us. We used to bring food up for the animals because they’re from here. They belong to this land,” she said. “And look where it is today.”
(Additional reporting by Leonardo Benassatto in La Vilavella, Yves Herman in Bordeaux, David Latona and Emma Pinedo in Madrid, Inti Landauro, Kate Abnett and Sudip Kar-Gupta in Brussels, Janis Laizans in Bordeaux; Writing by Ingrid Melander; Editing by Alison Williams and David Holmes)
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