We didn’t report on the fire in Almería that claimed so many lives; people trapped in the flames, because, frankly, it was all over international news from the very beginning, but it’s not the only major fire that Spain is coping with.
There is a forest fire that is out of control in the Sierra Norte de Guadalajara in the north of Spain, which started last Thursday and has so far consumed, 30,000 hectares. To give you a comparison, the devastating Almeria fire that claimed 12 lives and caused the evacuation of 1,600 people, only consumed 7,000 hectares.
In this fire in the North, six municipalities have had to be evacuated: Establés, Concha, Torrubia, Tartanedo, Anchuela del Campo, Aragoncillo and Pardos. Now, although that sounds like a lot of evacuated people, the total population is only 260, as they are little more than hamlets.
However, a second fire in the area has ‘joined in’ and taken out another 1,700 hectares already. This second one started in the town of Selas after a lorry suffered a blow out and the wheel, scraping along the tarmac caused a shower of sparks that set light to the bone-dry vegetation at the roadside… from there, a pine forest. The first fire, by the way, was caused by a combined harvester.
The forest fire service in Castilla La Mancha, Incendios Forestales de Castilla-La Mancha (INFOCAM) activated a level-two emergency and were joined by their colleagues in the Comunidad de Madrid, Castilla y León and Comunidad Valenciana. Fourteen aircraft and 16 land units were mobilised backed by the specialised Spanish Army unit, the Unidad Militar de Emergencias.
In the meantime, the Molina de Aragón Town hall (Guadalajara) has called on local farmers to use their heavy machinery to help create firebreaks.
(News: Guadalajara, Castilla-La Mancha)
Keywords: Huge Fire In The North, 30,000 Hectares, 14 Aircraft, 16 Land Units, Unidad Militar De Emergencias
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