Several fires still active Friday in Spain have already burned thousands of hectares as the country has been facing an extreme heat wave for almost a week.
The most devastating of them, fanned by “changing winds” in direction and “the heat”, burned between 5,000 and 7,000 hectares in the Sierra de la Culebra (Northwest), said the regional authorities of Castile- and-León.
More than 200 residents of this mountainous area near the border with Portugal had to be evacuated in the face of the advance of the flames, they added.
In the northeast of the country, hundreds of firefighters were still fighting several fires in Catalonia on “the most complicated day of this episode in terms of weather”, according to them.
A fire that broke out near Baldomar, in the province of Lleida, destroyed more than 940 hectares of forest, according to figures released Thursday by the regional government.
In the same province, firefighters managed to control two fires in Solsonés, while a fire in the neighboring province of Tarragona was also brought under control after burning 300 hectares.
In the neighboring region of Aragon, at least 1,200 hectares were burned by a fire in the municipality of Nonaspe, the prefecture said.
Speaking at a conference in Madrid on the occasion of World Drought Relief Day, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez paid tribute to firefighters “who risk their lives on the front line of fires”.
These fires broke out when Spain was affected, like France or Italy, by an extreme heat wave, a direct consequence of climate change, according to scientists.
According to forecasts by the Spanish Meteorological Agency (Aemet), temperatures should exceed 35 degrees on Friday over a large part of the territory and once again cross 40 degrees in several parts of the center, north-east and south of the country. .
This heat wave, unusual at this stage of the year in Spain, has caused an explosion in temperatures since last weekend, with peaks of up to 43 degrees, and is expected to last until Saturday.
Spain, which this year experienced its hottest May since the beginning of the century according to the meteorological agency, has already gone through four episodes of extreme temperatures over the last ten months, including this one.