The first major forest fire of the year in Spain has destroyed more than 4000 hectares after two days. The Spanish emergency service announced today that around 500 emergency services continued to fight the flames in the east of the country without a break during the night.

Since daybreak, 20 helicopters and fire-fighting planes could be used again, it said. Because of the fire, around 1,500 people had been taken to safety from their homes in more than ten towns in the provinces of Castellón and Teruel as a precaution.

The area of ​​forest destroyed on the border between the regions of Valencia and Aragon is roughly the size of 5,500 football pitches. According to official information, the extinguishing work was made more difficult by strong winds, low humidity and relatively high temperatures of more than 20 degrees. There were therefore many power outages, and several country roads were still closed on Saturday, it said.

land too dry

The cause of the fire remained unknown for the time being. The authorities suspect "an incorrectly carried out agricultural combustion". The Spanish Minister for Ecological Change, Teresa Ribera, also pointed to man-made climate change. "We are experiencing the fifth drought year in a row on the Iberian Peninsula," Ribera was quoted as saying by state television station RTVE. Unfortunately, there are more and more large fires outside of the fire season.

2022 was the most devastating forest fire year for Spain since the European forest fire information system EFFIS began recording. According to measurements by the European earth observation system Copernicus, an area of ​​a good 306,000 hectares was destroyed in 493 major fires last year. That's over 3000 square kilometers. For comparison: Saarland has an area of ​​almost 2570 square kilometers.