Rome 17 August : Italian firefighters have been fighting major fires in northern of the country as well as on the island of Sicily officials have told.A number of units were called out to help a forest fire that was sparked in the area of hiking west of Rimini, Adriatic coastal city of Rimini, dpa news agency reported the fire brigade reporting on Tuesday.
The emergency services rescued 10 persons from the zone to safety.
A video showed smoke soaring over the hilly terrain, and strong winds were able to stoke the flames the fire brigade said.
On the well-known vacation island of Sicily firefighters were fighting a blaze that broke out in the community of Trabia, which is located in the coast of Trabia east of Palermo over the course of the night.
According to Italian media reports, the fires also affected several residential buildings.
The people were evacuated due to of the risk of gas cylinders in the buildings which were exploding.
The fire brigade also fighting the fire from the air.
Dry conditions caused by drought, negligence or arson are believed to be the primary cause of the fires.
Experts suspect that the effects of the climate’s changing are the reason for the current drought in Italy this year.
According to information provided by the European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS) As of August 13, more than 42,000 hectares had burned in Italy to date this year, which is more than the average for this point in the past 15 years.
For this calculation, EFFIS only considers areas affected by fires that are at least 30 hectares or more.
