France is steeling itself for a fourth major heatwave this year, with punishing heat and parched landscapes tightening the strain on firefighters confronting a vast blaze near Bordeaux.
The wildfire has been carving a destructive route through the Gironde region in south-west France for a week.
A series of serious flare-ups yesterday prompted authorities to order the precautionary evacuation of thousands more residents and holiday-makers, amid fears that further departures may yet be needed.
Officials said the fire had been stabilised, even after 14 major flare-ups yesterday and several more overnight.
Weather, however, remains a central worry for emergency teams.
An orange heatwave alert is due to take effect from midday in Bordeaux, where temperatures could climb to 40 degrees, marking the region’s fourth heatwave in a summer already scarred by drought and fire.
Across France and Spain, wildfires have triggered unprecedented evacuations involving tens of thousands of people, sweeping through areas already exhausted by an exceptionally hot, dry season.
Heavy machinery cuts through trees to form a firebreak near Martignas-sur-Jalle, outside Bordeaux
Spanish residents return home as crews report ‘progress’ against wildfire
Thousands of people evacuated from their homes in Spain during huge wildfires began returning today, as the government said efforts were continuing to contain some of the most severe forest fires in the country’s modern history.
Evacuation orders were lifted yesterday for more than a dozen municipalities in the Madrid and Avila areas, the heart of blazes that had displaced tens of thousands of people.
“24,000 evacuated individuals have been able to return to their homes, and another 20,000 have been released from confinement in the Community of Madrid,” government delegate Francisco Martin Aguirre said on X late last night.
“Work continues to consolidate the progress made throughout the day in tackling the fire. The return of evacuees is proceeding without incident.”
Spain’s firefighting operation has been complicated by strong winds and a fresh heatwave, as flames burned through around 77,000 hectares (190,000 acres), nearly the size of New York City.
Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska said crews were bringing the fires under control, with work today focused on stabilising the situation and extinguishing all remaining flames.
A similar relaxation of restrictions had already taken place in the eastern Castellon area near Valencia, where the municipality of Vall d’Uixo lifted a confinement order for residents yesterday morning.
Firefighting aircraft release water over a wildfire near the village of Cebreros, in Spain’s Avila province
EU says wildfire response must adapt to climate change
The European Union must put more money into its wildfire response, sharpen its focus on forest management and do more to educate the public about fire risk as the climate changes, the bloc’s crisis response chief said while France and Spain battled deadly blazes.
“Climate change is accelerating. So our response must evolve just as quickly,” Hadja Lahbib, the EU’s Crisis Management Commissioner, said.
“We must prepare for risks before disasters strike, and not simply react afterwards.”
Ms Lahbib said buying more firefighting equipment alone would not be enough, arguing that countries should direct more EU funding toward forest management practices that lower wildfire risk and better inform citizens about “what behaviour they absolutely must avoid”, to reduce the chance of fires starting.
Around 90% of wildfires are caused by human activity, including campfires and discarded cigarettes.
The EU, however, has only a limited role in wildfire management, which remains the responsibility of national governments.
Brussels helps coordinate the deployment of additional resources pooled by European countries when a nation requests emergency assistance.
The EU also maintains its own “RescEU” reserve fleet of 22 firefighting aircraft and five helicopters, contracted from member countries.
As of yesterday, the EU had coordinated the deployment of seven planes and four helicopters to France, along with six planes and three ground forest firefighting teams to Spain.
Climate change is placing growing pressure on that system.
Ahead of this summer, the EU positioned more than 770 firefighters across high-risk countries, a record deployment that reflects how human-caused climate change is worsening the heat and drought that help wildfires spread more quickly and burn for longer.
EU officials have said they are preparing for the possibility that fires will still be burning in November this year.
“The scale and intensity of these disasters mean we will need to confirm strengthening our collective capacity,” Ms Lahbib said, adding that the Commission had proposed more than doubling crisis-response funding in the next EU budget, to €10.7 billion.
EU countries negotiating the budget have reduced that figure to €9.1 billion, according to their latest compromise proposal.
At the same time, the EU is buying its own permanent firefighting fleet, with 12 Canadair firefighting planes and five helicopters scheduled for delivery between 2027 and 2030.
Read more: Bordeaux a city on edge amid renewed wildfire warnings
