Wildfires wreaking death and mayhem

AT least 39 people have died in fires ravaging forests in northern and central Portugal over the past 24 hours, rescuers said yesterday, after three people were killed in Spain in blazes sparked by arsonists and fanned by Hurricane Ophelia.

The 39 deaths, which were confirmed by Portugal’s national civil protection agency and included a one-month-old baby, come four months after 64 people were killed in the deadliest fire in the country’s history in June.

“There are still places where security services have not yet managed to reach,” civil protection agency spokeswoman Patricia Gaspar said.

She said seven people were still missing due to the fires, which had also injured at least 63 people, including 16 critically.

The 524 registered outbreaks of fire in Portugal, by far the most since 2006, were caused by “higher-than-average temperatures for the season and the cumulative effect of drought”, Ms Gaspar said.

Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa reaffirmed his pledges to prevent new tragedies by carrying out “fundamental reforms” in forest management and firefighting.

“After this year, nothing should remain as it was before,” he said.

In Portugal, as in the northwestern Spanish region of Galicia, temperatures were cooler yesterday and weather services were forecasting rain, but about 3600 firefighters were still battling some 30 major fires in Portugal by evening.

In Spain, Galician authorities, who had declared three days of regional mourning, said there were still 15 active fires representing a risk to the population and homes.

One of the worst hit areas in Portugal was near the city of Lousa in the Coimbra region, where 650 firefighters were battling blazes.

“We went through absolute hell,” a resident of the town of Penacova, near Lousa, told RTP television.