Latest news with #CastileandLeón
The Guardian
2 days ago
- Climate
- The Guardian
Wildfires claim third life in Spain as intense heat continues across Europe
Wildfires raging across Spain have killed a third person as intense heat continues across vast swathes of Europe, forcing overwhelmed governments to call in support from their neighbours. The European Commission said it was sending water-bombing planes to Spain as it struggled to contain deadly blazes, with countries across the Balkans also receiving firefighting support. A volunteer firefighter died after battling a blaze in Castile and León, authorities said on Thursday, after the death of a fellow volunteer in the same region on Tuesday. A man died on the outskirts of Madrid on Monday as he tried to save horses from a burning stable. 'Death strikes us again with the loss of a second volunteer who has lost their life in León,' Spain's prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, said on Thursday. He thanked the 'heroes' protecting people from fires and said 'the threat remains extreme'. In Patras, Greece's third-largest city, firefighters pushed back a wildfire that had burned through the outskirts of the port and forced the evacuation of a children's hospital and a retirement home. Local media reported that a 19-year-old man who had allegedly confessed to starting the blaze was among a number of arrests made in connection to it. The Greek fire service spokesperson, Vasilios Vathrakoyannis, said the general situation had improved on all fronts after an all-night battle, but that a very high fire risk was still predicted for most areas of the country. 'Today is expected to be a very difficult day,' he said. Spain said it had deployed 1,000 military personnel and 50 aerial resources to tackle the fires, having become the fifth country in a week to activate the EU's civil protection mechanism to fight the fires. The European Commission announced that two planes stationed in France were expected to be deployed in Spain on Thursday. Greece is expected to receive two Swedish helicopters stationed in Bulgaria under the mechanism, which it activated on Tuesday, while Bulgaria, Albania and Montenegro – where a soldier died fighting a fire near the capital – have also received support from firefighters from several EU countries. The EU's civil protection mechanism, which coordinates responses during wars and other crises, has been activated 16 times during the current fire season. The number of activations in 2025 is already the same as the figure for the whole of the 2024 fire season, the commission said. Wildfires have burned more than 500,000 hectares in Europe so far this year, according to official data, an increase of 134% compared with the average over the past two decades. France experienced its largest wildfire since 1949 last week. The two Spanish firefighters who died were using brush cutters to slow the spread of a fire when they were engulfed by the flames on Tuesday afternoon, according to the Spanish daily El País. The fire is poised to become one of the largest in the country's history. Strong and variable winds spread flames that trapped the two men, the newspaper reported. One man died within a few hours, while the other, who suffered 85% burns, died after a day in hospital. Six people remain in hospital in the region with burns and serious injuries, local media reported. Sign up to This is Europe The most pressing stories and debates for Europeans – from identity to economics to the environment after newsletter promotion The deadly fires come as southern Europe suffers intense heat that has broken temperature records across the continent – made worse by fossil fuel pollution that traps sunlight and heats the planet – and which has dried out vegetation. 'It's obvious that climate change is exacerbating the severity of fires,' said Eduardo Rojas Briales, a forestry researcher at the Polytechnic University of Valencia and former deputy director general of the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization. 'But it's not responsible to wait for greenhouse gas emissions to drop … as the sole approach to addressing the problem.' He called for additional policies such as ensuring dead plant material is kept at manageable levels, creating gaps in vegetation, for instance through reversing rural abandonment, and using prescribed burning. 'There is no alternative but to build landscapes … that are truly resilient to fires,' he said. A report published on Thursday by XDI, a climate risk analysis group, found that the climate crisis has doubled the risk of infrastructure damage from forest fires in France, Italy, Greece, Romania and Bulgaria since 1990. It predicted risk would increase further still in future. 'We're all asking ourselves, how much worse can it get?' said Karl Mallon, XDI's head of science and technology. 'According to our latest analysis, a lot.'
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Climate
- Yahoo
Spain asks for European help to fight raging wildfires fuelled by heat, wind
Spain has officially asked for assistance from its European neighbours to fight forest fires that have been raging through the country's northwest. Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska said on Wednesday that Spain had requested two Canadair planes in anticipation of the weather forecast In an interview with local media Cadena SER, he said the country is ready to seek more help from European allies, such as more firefighters, when needed. Fires, fuelled by extreme temperatures and strong winds, have destroyed thousands of hectares in several regions of the country, as they have elsewhere in Europe, notably in France and Portugal. About fifteen major fires are burning in northwestern Spain, notably in the Castile and León and Galicia regions. Two people have been killed in the fires in Castile and León and seven people were hospitalised on Wednesday. More than 8,000 people have been evacuated as a precautionary measure in the face of two fires in the provinces of León and Zamora. According to the president of Galicia, Alfonso Rueda, thirty fires are being extinguished every day in the region. Some 11,500 hectares have burned, particularly in the Ourense province where firefighters have been unable to contain a large fire in Chandrexa de Queixa. (with newswires)
Times
4 days ago
- Climate
- Times
Spain wildfires: minister's joke about heat backfires
A political row has erupted in Spain after a minister joked that 'things are getting a little hot' amid a relentless wave of wildfires across the country. Óscar Puente, the transport minister and a close supporter of Pedro Sánchez, the Socialist prime minister, made the remark as about 21 fires burned across the country, claiming two lives and having scorched nearly 25,000 hectares this week. Puente's quip targeted the conservative government head of the north-central Castile and León region, Alfonso Fernández Mañueco, accusing him of being on holiday in Cádiz while his territory burnt. The minister said: 'Things are getting a little hot in Castile and León.' The remark was widely seen as tasteless given the scale of the destruction. Alberto Núñez Feijóo, the leader of the opposition Popular Party, immediately condemned the comment, calling for Sánchez to dismiss the minister. Puente replied that if a regional leader were enjoying 'fiestas' while constituents suffered floods or fires, he would expect their removal too. El País stated in an editorial on Wednesday: 'It's disheartening to see the government and the Popular Party embroiled in a dispute over the handling of the disasters in Castile and León. A country in shock deserves better than Minister Óscar Puente's frivolous comments on social media.' Castile and León remains hardest hit, particularly in León and Zamora, affecting tens of municipalities and forcing thousands of people to evacuate. Lake Carucedo was used as a water source for firefighters in Galicia SAMUEL DE ROMAN PEREZ/ANADOLU/GETTY IMAGES Elsewhere in the region, a firefighting volunteer died from severe burns, while several people were hospitalised as dozens of wildfires fuelled by strong winds and scorching heat continued to rage across the country. The victim, a 35-year-old volunteer, had been attempting to create firebreaks near the town of Nogarejas when he became trapped in the blaze, regional officials said. An employee of a Spanish equestrian centre died from his injuries in Tres Cantos, a wealthy suburb north of Madrid, officials said, as he was reported to have tried to save horses. This year's total of affected terrain exceeded 69,000 hectares, already above the 18-year average. Seven regions were grappling with blazes. Emergency forces, including 1,000 military personnel and over 5,000 police and civil guard members, were engaged in firefighting operations. In Andalusia, in the south, the second fire in a few days in Tarifa forced the evacuation of 2,000 people on Monday while in Galicia, in the northwest, fires in Chandrexa de Queixa and Maceda burned a combined 4,330 hectares. Fire caused disruptions to high-speed rail services between Madrid and Galicia. The village of Parafita in southern Galicia VIOLETA SANTOS MOURA/REUTERS The village of Vilaza in southern Galencia MIGUEL RIOPA/AFP/GETTY IMAGES Aemet, the national meteorological agency, said the forecast for extinguishing the fires was unfavourable until at least Thursday, due to expected dry storms that could spark more fires. Extreme heat is breaking temperature records across Europe, with many areas seeing fires or raising alert levels. In southwest France, records were broken on Monday in Angoulême, Bergerac, Bordeaux, Saint-Émilion and Saint-Girons. Météo France said the 'often remarkable, even unprecedented, maximum temperatures' in the region were 12C above typical figures for the last few decades. Large forest fires burned along the coast of Croatia, where temperatures exceeded 38 and 39C and affected neighbouring countries in the Balkans.
Times
4 days ago
- Climate
- Times
Spain wildfires: Row erupts as minister jokes ‘things getting hot'
A political row has erupted in Spain after a minister joked that 'things are getting a little hot' amid a relentless wave of wildfires across the country. Óscar Puente, the transport minister and a close supporter of Pedro Sánchez, the Socialist prime minister, made the remark as about 21 fires burned across the country, claiming two lives and having scorched nearly 25,000 hectares this week. Puente's quip targeted the conservative government head of the north-central Castile and León region, Alfonso Fernández Mañueco, accusing him of being on holiday in Cádiz while his territory burnt. The minister said: 'Things are getting a little hot in Castile and León.' The remark was widely seen as tasteless given the scale of the destruction. Alberto Núñez Feijóo, the leader of the opposition Popular Party, immediately condemned the comment, calling for Sánchez to dismiss the minister. Puente replied that if a regional leader were enjoying 'fiestas' while constituents suffered floods or fires, he would expect their removal too. El País stated in an editorial on Wednesday: 'It's disheartening to see the government and the Popular Party embroiled in a dispute over the handling of the disasters in Castile and León. A country in shock deserves better than Minister Óscar Puente's frivolous comments on social media.' Castile and León remains hardest hit, particularly in León and Zamora, affecting tens of municipalities and forcing thousands of people to evacuate. Elsewhere in the region, a firefighting volunteer died from severe burns, while several people were hospitalised as dozens of wildfires fuelled by strong winds and scorching heat continued to rage across the country. The victim, a 35-year-old volunteer, had been attempting to create firebreaks near the town of Nogarejas when he became trapped in the blaze, regional officials said. An employee of a Spanish equestrian centre died from his injuries in Tres Cantos, a wealthy suburb north of Madrid, officials said, as he was reported to have tried to save horses. This year's total of affected terrain exceeded 69,000 hectares, already above the 18-year average. Seven regions were grappling with blazes. Emergency forces, including 1,000 military personnel and over 5,000 police and civil guard members, were engaged in firefighting operations. In Andalusia, in the south, the second fire in a few days in Tarifa forced the evacuation of 2,000 people on Monday while in Galicia, in the northwest, fires in Chandrexa de Queixa and Maceda burned a combined 4,330 hectares. Fire caused disruptions to high-speed rail services between Madrid and Galicia. Aemet, the national meteorological agency, said the forecast for extinguishing the fires was unfavourable until at least Thursday, due to expected dry storms that could spark more fires. Extreme heat is breaking temperature records across Europe, with many areas seeing fires or raising alert levels. • Roll clouds in Portugal and wildfires in Turkey: what's behind the heatwave? In southwest France, records were broken on Monday in Angoulême, Bergerac, Bordeaux, Saint-Émilion and Saint-Girons. Météo France said the 'often remarkable, even unprecedented, maximum temperatures' in the region were 12C above typical figures for the last few decades. Large forest fires burned along the coast of Croatia, where temperatures exceeded 38 and 39C and affected neighbouring countries in the Balkans. Wildfires continued to rage in Greece after a prolonged drought, prompting evacuations.
CBC
4 days ago
- Climate
- CBC
Smoke fills skies in Spain as wildfires spread
Spain is among several European countries continuing to battle wildfires on Tuesday amid record summer heat, with firefighters and nearly 1,000 soldiers fighting blazes in regions including Castile and León, Castile-La Mancha, Andalusia and Galicia. Outside Madrid, firefighters had largely contained a blaze that broke out Monday night and killed one man, authorities said.
