European Commission intervenes as wildfires kill at least 7 in Spain
Aug. 16 (UPI) -- The European Commission is deploying firefighting aircraft to Spain, where at least seven have died as 14 wildfires have flared amid a European heat wave.
The commission is sending an unknown number of water-bombing planes to help put out the wildfires in Spain and wildfire-impacted areas in the Balkans, The Guardian reported on Saturday.
The announcement came after a volunteer firefighter died on Thursday while fighting a wildfire in northern Spain's Castile and Leon region.
A total of seven people have died in the Spanish wildfires along the nation's northern coastal areas, the BBC reported.
"Death strikes us again with the loss of a second volunteer who has lost their life in Leon," Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said on Thursday, as reported by The Guardian.
He described firefighting volunteers as "heroes" who are protecting the Spanish people and said the wildfire "threat remains extreme."
Another volunteer firefighter died on Tuesday, and a Spanish man died while trying to save horses from a stable that caught fire near Madrid on Monday.
Sanchez on Friday said wildfire conditions remain "very tough" as Spain's national weather agency reported an "extreme fire risk" in northern and western Spain, the BBC reported.
The weather service predicted highs up to 104 degrees in Spain, where several wildfires have merged into a single conflagration that has closed several of the region's highways and halted rail services in northwestern Spain.
Wildfires also have been reported in Portugal, France, Greece and the Balkans.
Spain so far has reported about three times the number of wildfires that it normally experiences during a typical summer.
The heatwave is predicted to continue at least until Monday with highs of up to 111 degrees with moderate winds that could spread airborne sparks and embers.
The European Union reported 2,429 square miles of burnt land so far this year, and the Spanish wildfires account for more than 600 square miles of that total.
Officials in Albania, Bulgaria, Greece and Montenegro have requested emergency assistance from the EU.
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