Southern France is battling wildfires again. While hundreds of firefighters are trying to control the fires, thousands of residents and vacationers have been evacuated as a precaution.
An estimated 3,000 campers and residents from villages north of Montpellier had to leave the area as a precaution. The fear is that the fire, which has already destroyed 700 hectares there, will spread even further.
The fire burns on a rocky outcrop that is hard to reach. This, along with dryness, makes extinguishing very difficult. So the French fire brigade estimates that it will take another three days to bring the fire under control. Two firefighters were slightly injured.
Things also go wrong in the Gironde, the southwestern region around Bordeaux. A large fire broke out in Landeras on Tuesday. This comes on top of the massive fire that broke out there last July. At least 3,500 people have been evacuated as a precaution from the forest area, where 1,000 hectares have already been destroyed.
The fire brigade considers the situation “extremely unfavorable” due to wind and drought and expects to work on the fire at least overnight. “I’m back in hell again,” the French fire brigade wrote on Twitter. Pictures of firefighting activities.
In total, more than 50,000 hectares have been burned in France this year. In July, the country had a record number of burned areas. This was shown by calculations made by the European Commission’s Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), which has been keeping these statistics since 2006.
