Daily Archives: August 16, 2019

More than 500 firefighters have been called out to battle a blaze that has already destroyed hundreds of hectares of pine forest in southern France. Some 900 hectares have been destroyed since the fire broke out on Wednesday afternoon in the rugged hills of the Aude department, about 100 kilometres southeast of Toulouse. Commander Philippe Fabre of the Aude fire service told AFP there had been a “slight letup” early on Thursday, with firefighters able to halt the fire’s advance. But he said winds were expected to gust at up to 60 km/h later in the day, and efforts would be focused on “extinguishing the fiercest hotspots and preventing flare-ups in hard-to-reach areas”.

Greek firefighters backed by water-dropping planes and helicopters were battling a wildfire burning through a protected nature reserve on the island of Evia for a second day Wednesday, where hundreds of people had been evacuated from four villages and a monastery. The six planes and five helicopters were concentrating on areas where access to the island’s dense pine forest, which includes canyons, was difficult by land. More than 250 firefighters, dozens of soldiers and volunteers were battling the wildfire that broke out at 3 a.m. Tuesday. A state of emergency was declared for the area on Tuesday, when strong winds had hampered firefighting and carried smoke from Greece’s second-largest island as far as the capital, Athens, some 75 kilometres (47 miles) to the south.