{"id":234672,"date":"2025-08-19T07:21:17","date_gmt":"2025-08-19T07:21:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abianewscentral.com.ng\/deadly-wildfires-rage-across-spain-as-record-area-of-land-burnt-channels-television\/"},"modified":"2025-08-19T07:21:17","modified_gmt":"2025-08-19T07:21:17","slug":"deadly-wildfires-rage-across-spain-as-record-area-of-land-burnt-channels-television","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/deadly-wildfires-rage-across-spain-as-record-area-of-land-burnt-channels-television\/","title":{"rendered":"Deadly Wildfires Rage Across Spain As Record Area Of Land Burnt \u2022 Channels Television"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Deadly Wildfires Rage Across Spain As Record Area Of Land Burnt \u2022 Channels Television<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Thousands of firefighters backed by soldiers and water-bombing aircraft on Monday battled over 20 major wildfires raging across western Spain, where officials say a record area of land has already been burnt.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Spain and neighbouring Portugal have been particularly affected by forest fires fuelled by heatwaves and drought blamed on climate change that have hit southern Europe.<\/p>\n<p>Two firefighters were killed on Sunday \u2014 one in each country, both in road accidents \u2014 taking the death toll to two in Portugal and four in Spain.<\/p>\n<p>Spain\u2019s civil protection chief Virginia Barcones told public television TVE that 23 blazes were classified as \u201coperational level two\u201d, meaning they pose a direct threat to nearby communities.<\/p>\n<p>The fires, now entering their second week, are concentrated in the western regions of Castile and Leon, Galicia and Extremadura, where thousands of people have been forced to flee their homes.<\/p>\n<p>Residents said they were frustrated with what they regarded as poor preparation and limited resources.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNo one\u2019s shown up here, nobody,\u201d Patricia Vila, 42, told AFPTV in the village of Vilamartin de Valdeorras in Ourense province of Galicia.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNot a single damn helicopter, not one plane, has come to drop water and cool things down a bit.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<h3><strong>\u2018Fire Everywhere\u2019\u00a0<\/strong><\/h3>\n<figure id=\"attachment_951561\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-951561\" style=\"width: 1200px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-951561\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns=\" http:=\"\" alt=\"\" width=\"1200\" height=\"800\" data-lazy-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.channelstv.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/AFP__20250816__69PV7R8__v1__MidRes__SpainWildfireWeatherClimate.jpg 1200w, https:\/\/www.channelstv.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/AFP__20250816__69PV7R8__v1__MidRes__SpainWildfireWeatherClimate-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.channelstv.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/AFP__20250816__69PV7R8__v1__MidRes__SpainWildfireWeatherClimate-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.channelstv.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/AFP__20250816__69PV7R8__v1__MidRes__SpainWildfireWeatherClimate-768x512.jpg 768w\" data-lazy-sizes=\"(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px\" data-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.channelstv.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/AFP__20250816__69PV7R8__v1__MidRes__SpainWildfireWeatherClimate.jpg\"\/><noscript><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-951561\" src=\"https:\/\/www.channelstv.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/AFP__20250816__69PV7R8__v1__MidRes__SpainWildfireWeatherClimate.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1200\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.channelstv.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/AFP__20250816__69PV7R8__v1__MidRes__SpainWildfireWeatherClimate.jpg 1200w, https:\/\/www.channelstv.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/AFP__20250816__69PV7R8__v1__MidRes__SpainWildfireWeatherClimate-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.channelstv.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/AFP__20250816__69PV7R8__v1__MidRes__SpainWildfireWeatherClimate-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.channelstv.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/AFP__20250816__69PV7R8__v1__MidRes__SpainWildfireWeatherClimate-768x512.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px\"\/><\/noscript><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-951561\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Forest firefighters fight a wildfire in Castrillo de Cabrera, northwestern Spain, on August 16, 2025. As Spain enters its third week of heatwave alerts, firefighters continue to battle blazes in the northwest and west of the country, with army units deployed to help contain the blazes. (Photo by Cesar Manso \/ AFP)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Signs of the fires were everywhere in the province, from ashen forests and blackened soil to destroyed homes, with thick smoke forcing people to wear masks.<\/p>\n<p>Firefighters battled the flames as locals in just shorts and T-shirts used water from hoses and buckets to try to stop the spread.<\/p>\n<p>More than 343,000 hectares (848,000 acres) of land \u2014 the equivalent of nearly half a million football pitches \u2014 have been destroyed this year in Spain, setting a new national record, according to the European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS).<\/p>\n<p>The previous record of 306,000 hectares was set in the same period three years ago.<\/p>\n<p>Spain is being helped with firefighting aircraft from France, Italy, Slovakia and the Netherlands, while Portugal is receiving air support from Sweden and Morocco.<\/p>\n<p>But the size and severity of the fires and the intensity of the smoke \u2014 visible from space \u2014 were making \u201cairborne action\u201d difficult,\u201d Spanish Defence Minister Margarita Robles told TVE.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s a very difficult, very complicated situation,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n<p>Thousands of people have been forced to flee their homes since the wildfires began last week.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe had to run away because the fire was coming in from everywhere\u2014everywhere, above us, below us, all around,\u201d said Isidoro, 83, in Vilamartin de Valdeorras.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<h3><strong>\u2018At War\u2019\u00a0<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>Across the border in Portugal, some 2,000 firefighters were deployed across the north and centre of the country on Monday, with about half of them concentrated in the town of Arganil.<\/p>\n<p>Some 216,000 hectares of land have been destroyed across Portugal since the start of the year.<\/p>\n<p>Portuguese Prime Minister Luis Montenegro said the country had endured 24 days of weather conditions of \u201cunprecedented severity\u201d with high temperature and strong winds.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are at war, and we must triumph in this fight,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>Officials in both countries expressed hope that the weather would turn to help tackle the fires.<\/p>\n<p>Spain\u2019s meteorological agency said the heatwave, which has seen temperatures hit 45C in parts of the country, was coming to an end.<\/p>\n<p>Officials in Castile and Leon said a firefighter died on Sunday night when the water truck he was driving flipped over on a steep forest road and down a slope, days after two other volunteer firefighters were killed in the region.<\/p>\n<p>A Romanian employee of a riding school north of Madrid lost his life trying to protect horses from the fire.<\/p>\n<p>In Portugal, President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa said a firefighter died on Sunday in a traffic accident that left two colleagues seriously injured.<\/p>\n<p>A former mayor in the eastern town of Guarda died on Friday while trying to tackle a fire.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Spain,Spain Wildfire,wildfires<br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.channelstv.com\/2025\/08\/18\/deadly-wildfires-rage-across-spain-as-record-area-of-land-burnt\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Deadly Wildfires Rage Across Spain As Record Area Of Land Burnt \u2022 Channels Television \u00a0 Thousands of firefighters backed by soldiers and water-bombing aircraft on Monday battled over 20 major wildfires raging across western Spain, where officials say a record area of land has already been burnt. Spain and neighbouring Portugal have been particularly affected [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":234673,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[173],"tags":[1057,1662,447],"class_list":["post-234672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-spain","tag-spain-wildfire","tag-wildfires"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=234672"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234672\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=234672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=234672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abiaradiostations.com.ng\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=234672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}