Spain and Portugal were still trying to overcome several forest fires on Wednesday, especially in central Portugal, where the fire in the Serra da Estrela natural park is mobilizing important resources.
In Spain, more than 10,000 hectares burned near Valencia
Spain, first of all, has been faced with a wave of forest fires in recent weeks, particularly in the province of Valencia, in the east. Rising temperatures favor the phenomenon in the first place.
The fire that has raged since Monday in Bejis, 70 kilometers northwest of Valencia, has grown rapidly, devastating more than 10,000 hectares, and has caused the evacuation of 1,500 people, according to regional officials. About 200 kilometers further south, in the Vall de Ebo, the weather has offered a respite to the hundreds of firefighters who have been fighting a large fire since Saturday.
A forest scourge that is also a scourge for the local fauna, as shown in the following video showing wild boars trying to flee.
The rain and hail, which fell on an area where the flames devastated more than 11,000 hectares, however, left the firefighting planes and their equipment on the ground. At the height of the disaster, some twenty aircraft assisted the rescue services in the sky, according to the local press, which confirmed the evacuation of six municipalities and 1,500 people.
The video filmed on the ground by firefighters at the construction site reveals an overwhelming spectacle.
Terrible year on the fire front in Spain
The fire in Valencia is undoubtedly the most dazzling and frightening of the fires currently raging in Spain, but it is not an isolated case. According to a media outlet Zero Wave, we still deplore a dozen additional fires in the country in recent days, specifically six in Galicia (three of them still active on Wednesday), five in Asturias, or Anón de Moncayo near Zaragoza. This last catastrophe even devoured 6,000 hectares.
The statistics reported by RTVE, based on data compiled by the European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), are staggering: these fires destroyed more than 270,000 hectares of vegetation in Spain between last January and August 15.
It should be noted, however, that this total is 100,000 hectares lower according to the Spanish government, which stopped counting a week before its European partner.
Portugal faces two fires
In Portugal, after being declared under control last week, the Serra da Estrela fire reignited on Monday. An investigation has been opened to determine the causes.
90% of the fire was under control on Wednesday at noon, according to statements made by the commander of Civil Protection, Miguel Cruz, during a press conference on Wednesday night.
This fire, which has already burned some 25,000 hectares of this protected area, according to provisional estimates, is nevertheless the most important of the summer in Portugal.
Even on Tuesday there had been a smell of burning in Madrid. It destroyed unique species in the park recognized by Unesco, in the heart of the Serra da Estrela mountain range that culminates at about 2000 meters.
The objective of the 1,200 firefighters, as well as the eight aircraft, deployed on the scene is to control this fire on Friday before temperatures rise again.
In addition, another focus mobilized aid on Wednesday afternoon, near the Caldas da Rainha region, in the center of the country. A firefighter fighting the local flames even lost his life there, killed by a heart attack.
The summer of all dangers
“We have not yet reached the end of this critical period of fires,” warned José Luis Carneiro, Minister of the Interior, on Wednesday, after a meeting with officials of the Portuguese Institute of the Sea and the Atmosphere (IPMA).
“We are going to enter a third heat wave” starting on Saturday “which should last until September”, which is shaping up to be a “hotter and drier month” than normal, he said.
Portugal, which is experiencing an exceptional drought this year, has already experienced the hottest month of July in almost a century. Since the beginning of the year, some 92,000 hectares have been burned, the largest area since the deadly fires of 2017 that killed some 100 people, according to the latest report by the Institute for the Conservation of Nature and Forests.
These tens of thousands of hectares burned in the Iberian Peninsula echo the conclusions of the study carried out by the Global Forest Watch association, the World Resources Institute and the University of Maryland and published this Wednesday. The survey, read here by the BBC, found that 9 million hectares of forests had been charred worldwide in 2021 alone, twice as many as in 2001. Using the image now enshrined in a similar case, the report claims that the fires they cost the world the equivalent of 16 football fields… per minute that year. Worse yet, we would lose an additional three million hectares of forest to the flames each year. Or the area of a country like Belgium.
Source: BFM TV
