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Some 100 fires reported by national authorities stretched the
firefighting brigades. Authorities have yet to give figures on
how many people have had to evacuate and how many homes have
been lost.
Portuguese state broadcaster RTP showed images of houses burnt
to the ground and smoke billowing over charred terrain in the
area of Castro de Aire.
One civilian has died from burns and another from cardiac arrest
from the fires that broke out over the weekend, according to
civil protection authorities.
Among the hardest hit areas is the district of Aveiro, south of
the northern city of Porto, where a firefighter died from an
unspecified illness while on duty. Portuguese Prime Minister
Luís Montenegro said on Monday that the firefighter was “victim
of a sudden illness” and offered his condolences to his family,
friends and co-workers.
Ground units were supported by Portuguese water dumping
aircraft. Fellow European Union members Spain, France Italy and
Greece have committed to providing eight more planes to help
local forces.
“The EU stands with Portugal as it battles major wildfires,”
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in a
message on X. “I thank France, Greece, Italy and Spain for their
rapid reaction. This is EU solidarity at its best.”
Still, televised images showed some residents wielding tree
branches and buckets of water to try to save their homes from
encroaching fires.
With no rain to relieve in the situation in sight, national
authorities prolonged an alert for fires until Thursday. The
measure included a ban on farmers using heavy machinery to
harvest crops because of the risk of sparks that could start
more fires.
The dry and hot conditions behind the outbreaks in Portugal came
while downpours caused flooding in central Europe.
Portugal was devasted by massive fires in 2017 that killed over
120 people and burned over half a million hectares.
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Joseph Wilson reported from Barcelona, Spain.
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