Madrid 16 August : Teams of firefighters in Spain continue to fight a number of massive forest fires throughout the country.A forest fire that is about 60km north-east of Alicante has destroyed around 6,500 acres of forest since the 13th of August according to the state television station RTVE.
Around 1,200 residents in the vicinity of Pego’s town of Pego were forced to move out of their homes due to safety concerns according to the dpa news agency.
Within the autonomous community of Valencia there were two smaller-scale wildfires.
Another huge forest fire raged in the town of Anon de Moncayo, west of the city of Zaragoza in Aragon.Around 1,500 people had to evacuate their homes over the weekend, but many have returned.
The fire isn’t yet in control and has so far destroyed around 6 hectares, which is a decrease from estimates of 8000.
However the situation has improved slightly near Murcia in the south of the country following the blaze that RTVE claimed was caused by lightning strikes.
The most destructive forest fire that has occurred since the beginning of the year in Spain close to Zamora near the border with Portugal It was put under control this weekend, as per the reports.
Since July 17 31,500 acres of scrubland and forest are damaged in the fire.Two persons have died.
The drought has been going on for months, extreme heat that experts blame on the climate changing process, as well as dry air have all come together to create new fires that be sparked across the country.
A number of other southern European nations have also experienced similar fires.
The threat of forest fires is “extremely very high” in parts of the Spanish regions of Andalusia, Aragon and Catalonia the EU’s Copernicus forest fire information system warned on Twitter.
2022 has already been the most devastating year for forest fires in Spain since records started, with over 380 forest fires being recorded.
In the EU in general the area of burning this year is at a an all-time high.
According to the data of the European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS) more than 660,000 hectares of land have been burned as of the 13th of August.
Records began to be counted in 2006, and since then the average amount of land burned in a year is just under 190,000 hectares with the previous record of just 421,000 hectares.
The data indicates that more than 245,000 acres have been burned in Spain alone this year.
In France the number is 61,000 hectares, and in Germany more than 4,300 acres.
