Portugal, Spain, Greece… southern Europe in flames

Helpless inhabitants, faced with the fire that threatens their village. In the region of Braganza (Portugal), the flames are dangerously close to the houses. A whole village had to be evacuated on Friday July 15. 170 km away, another fire broke out in the region of Porto (Portugal). Residents are doing their best to slow the fire. A drop of water, faced with the magnitude of the flames. “The government maintains nothing. (…) Along the road, everyone sees it, the trees sometimes even form a tunnel one over the other. The light can pass easily from one side of the road to the other“, says a man.

More than 30,000 hectares of Portuguese forest have already gone up in smoke, in a dozen fires. More than 900 firefighters are mobilized. On Friday, the pilot of a water bomber crashed with his plane, bringing the death toll from the fires to two. The work of firefighters is made difficult by extreme temperatures, up to 47°C. Similar scenes are happening in Spain. In Andalusia, 2,300 people had to leave their homes. In Greece, the earth is also burning near Athens. All of southern Europe is on fire. The situation is expected to worsen with the scorching temperatures expected in the coming days.