{"id":828330,"date":"2026-07-28T04:16:14","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T04:16:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/828330\/"},"modified":"2026-07-28T04:16:14","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T04:16:14","slug":"france-and-spain-race-to-contain-huge-wildfires-before-fresh-heatwave-begins-wildfires","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/828330\/","title":{"rendered":"France and Spain race to contain huge wildfires before fresh heatwave begins | Wildfires"},"content":{"rendered":"

Firefighters in France<\/a> and Spain are racing to bring huge wildfires under control before another heatwave this week that will complicate efforts to tame the flames.<\/p>\n

Spain\u2019s interior minister, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, said Monday and Tuesday were \u201cabsolutely crucial days\u201d before temperatures rise again from Wednesday, prompting prime minister, Pedro S\u00e1nchez, to warn: \u201cWe face difficult hours, complex hours\u201d ahead.<\/p>\n

EU officials have said wildfires could still be burning until early November in what threatens to be a record-breaking year for the area of land burned.<\/p>\n

\"RaceRace against time to contain wildfires in France and Spain – The Latest<\/p>\n

A fire in the hilly terrain of \u00c1vila, west of Madrid, has become Spain\u2019s largest on record, burning 50,000 hectares (125,000 acres). Authorities are battling two separate fires north-west of Madrid, taking the total area of scorched land near the capital to 70,000 hectares.<\/p>\n

Spain\u2019s state meteorological agency, Aemet, said the heatwave would last until \u201cat least\u201d Sunday, \u201cmaking firefighting efforts more difficult due to high temperatures [and] locally gusty southerly winds\u201d.<\/p>\n

France was also in \u201ca race against time\u201d to control wildfires before another heatwave this week, said Eric Brocardi, a fire service spokesperson. Weather forecasters have said temperatures could reach 40C (104F) is some parts of the country from Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Charred cars in the Spanish village of Chapiner\u00eda on Monday. Photograph: Violeta Santos Moura\/Reuters<\/p>\n

This would complicate efforts to control the wildfire in Gironde in south-west France, which the interior minister, Laurent Nu\u00f1ez, described as \u201cextremely intense and unpredictable \u2026 generating its own winds and advancing erratically toward the Bordeaux metropolitan area\u201d.<\/p>\n

The mayor of Bordeaux, Thomas Cazenave, told the BBC he is bracing for \u201call eventualities\u201d, as the fire advanced to within 15km (nine miles) from the city. \u201cWe are preparing to accommodate a large number of people should further evacuations be ordered,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

On a visit to Bordeaux, the French president, Emmanuel Macron, said: \u201cThe coming weeks will be tough and we have to hold out.\u201d<\/p>\n

But he said a smaller fire in the adjoining Landes \u2013 which forced the evacuation of more than 30,000 people \u2013 was \u201ccontained\u201d but remained \u201cvirulent\u201d. \u201cWe must be extremely cautious over the next few hours and the coming days,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The Gironde fire has so far burned 42,000 hectares, making it one of the biggest devastations of land in France since the second world war.<\/p>\n

In the Cestas commune, about 10 miles from the city of Bordeaux, firefighters used mechanical diggers to uproot trees in an attempt to create a firebreak.<\/p>\n

map<\/a><\/p>\n

The vast fire, which has triggered the evacuation of 220,000 people, had not progressed during the early hours of Monday but was \u201cnot contained\u201d and remained \u201cvery complicated to control\u201d, Nu\u00f1ez said.<\/p>\n

Speaking after an emergency meeting of the French government on Monday, he described this year\u2019s wildfires as \u201ccompletely exceptional\u201d. More than 116,000 hectares of forest and vegetation have been burned since January, far exceeding the 70,000 hectares reported for the whole of 2025.<\/p>\n

chart<\/a><\/p>\n

Spain\u2019s government said the 172,000 hectares of forested land burned this year was six times greater than the equivalent figure for 2025.<\/p>\n

S\u00e1nchez told a climate conference the wildfires were not isolated incidents.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is the most painful manifestation of a climate emergency that is making \u2026 wildfires more voracious and heatwaves more frequent, and as a result our land more vulnerable,\u201d he said. \u201cIt is no longer an exception. It is the rule.\u201d<\/p>\n

The European Commission\u2019s lead official on the green transition, Teresa Ribera, said Europe was not prepared for the consequences of the climate crisis. In an interview with El Pa\u00eds<\/a> she said the commission would propose an adaptation strategy in October that would be much more comprehensive than policies implemented so far.<\/p>\n

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Pedro S\u00e1nchez visits a firefighters\u2019 control centre in La Vall d\u2019Uixo. Photograph: Manuel Bruque\/EPA<\/p>\n

A series of heatwaves, including record-breaking temperatures in June, that scientists say would have been impossible without the climate crisis<\/a>, has left parched soils and tinder-dry vegetation that have fuelled this summer\u2019s fires.<\/p>\n

A European Commission official said the wildfire season had begun in April and could last until early November. Officials also stressed the rising risks for fighting wildfires from the middle of the week in France, Spain and Greece.<\/p>\n

The EU executive has coordinated the dispatch of seven planes and four helicopters to France, as well as six planes and three forest firefighting teams to Spain, after the countries triggered the bloc\u2019s emergency assistance mechanism. EU officials have also been sent to the Bordeaux region to assist local authorities.<\/p>\n

A fire engine drives through smoke near Marcheprime outside Bordeaux. Photograph: Emma Da Silva\/AP<\/p>\n

Officials stressed the unprecedented nature of recent fires, which have spread rapidly over large areas. A commission official said that a recent fire in southern Spain that killed 13 people<\/a> had reached speeds of 4 mph, while firefighters are able to react only to fires moving 300 metres an hour or less.<\/p>\n

The scale of Europe\u2019s wildfires has raised questions about the continent\u2019s ability to respond. Italy is among about 10 European countries that have sent firefighting equipment or teams to France and Spain while grappling with its own blazes.<\/p>\n

Several fires broke out in northern and central Portugal, officials said, with over 1,000 firefighters and other professionals battling the flames.<\/p>\n

Firefighters fought to extinguish a major wildfire in Italy\u2019s southern region of Puglia on Monday. More than 400 people, many of them tourists staying in campsites set among pine forests, were evacuated by sea from the Gargano peninsula on Sunday as the blaze, fanned by strong winds, encroached on beaches.<\/p>\n

A further 58 people were evacuated from their homes in Maratea as a wildfire swept through neighbouring Basilicata.<\/p>\n

Italy is bracing for its fourth heatwave this year as temperatures edge up towards highs of 38C to 40C from Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Smoke from the fires in France is continuing to cause a \u201cmarked deterioration\u201d in air quality across a swathe of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region and beyond, with health authorities warning about the danger.<\/p>\n

Elderly people, pregnant women and those with respiratory issues and chronic conditions were advised to take precautions. Local health authorities said people should close windows, wear an FFP2 mask outside and avoid strenuous activity.<\/p>\n

The prime minister\u2019s office said more than 1.5 million FFP2 masks had been sent to the region.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Firefighters in France and Spain are racing to bring huge wildfires under control before another heatwave this week…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":828331,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[64,63,75,128],"class_list":["post-828330","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/828330","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=828330"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/828330\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/828331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=828330"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=828330"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=828330"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}