SPAIN: FOREST FIRE FORCES HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE TO EVACUATE THEIR VILLAGES IN SOUTHERN SPAIN.
Record ID:
648073
SPAIN: FOREST FIRE FORCES HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE TO EVACUATE THEIR VILLAGES IN SOUTHERN SPAIN.
- Title: SPAIN: FOREST FIRE FORCES HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE TO EVACUATE THEIR VILLAGES IN SOUTHERN SPAIN.
- Date: 18th July 2005
- Summary: (BN06) GUADALAJARA,SPAIN (JULY 18, 20050 (REUTERS) (NIGHT VIEWS) 1. LV/GV/PAN: EMERGENCY VEHICLES WITH FLASHING LIGHTS; FIRES; EMERGENCY VEHICLE DRIVING (4 SHOTS0 0.30 2. LV/GV/MV: FIRE FIGHTER; FIREFIGHTERS TURNING HOSES ON FIRE; FIREFIGHTER WITH HOSE (10 SHOTS) 1.44 3. LV/GV/MV: EARTH MOVING VEHICLE CLEARING FOREST AREA; TREES ON FIRE; FIREFIGHTERS USING HOSES TO PUT OUT FIRE; BURNING TREE STUMP (5 SHOTS) 2.30 (BN06)SANTA MARIA DEL ESPINO, SPAIN (JULY 18, 2005) (REUTERS) (NIGHT VIEWS) 4. GV/PAN: VEHICLES IN STREET IN TOWN 2.37 5. CU: CLOCK SHOWING 0420 2.41 6. MV/GV/LV: FIRE ENGINE HOUSES; DESRTED STREET; FIRE ENGINE TRAVELLING ALONG ROAD (4 SHOTS) 3.02 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
- Embargoed: 2nd August 2005 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: GUADALAJARA REGION AND SANTA MARIA DEL ESPINO, SPAIN
- Country: Spain
- Reuters ID: LVAAR4YVNL16YHL4XNISWXLVIG0
- Story Text: Firefighters try to control a forest blaze that
forced hundreds of people to evacuate their villages in
drought-stricken Spain.
Firefighters were tackling a forest fire raging
along a 17-km (10-mile) front in central Spain on Monday
(July 18).
A local government source said up to 14 firefighters
died trying to control the blaze on Sunday (July 17).
The fire broke out on Saturday (July 16) in a nature
reserve in the Guadalajara area east of Madrid after
visitors failed to put out a barbecue properly, officials
said.
By Sunday night it was spreading out of control after
scorching thousands of hectares of pine trees and brush.
Parched by a heatwave and the worst drought since the
1940s, much of Spain is like a tinder box and fierce fires
are burning in several regions.
Jose Luis Samper, mayor of the town of Riba de
Saelices, near where the deadly fire began, said a fire
patrol that had come from nearby Soria province to help was
surprised by the flames and trapped in a remote spot.
"After they had been missing for more than two hours,
some people from this village ventured out ... and finally
found them. There was only one survivor. We don't know
exactly how many bodies, but they found at least 12 bodies,
absolutely burned," he told Spanish state radio.
He said the victims were men and women in their 20s.
Media reports said the patrol, which had two trucks and
three four-wheel-drive vehicles, was caught by a sudden
change in the wind.
Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la
Vega, who rushed to the scene to get first-hand
information, was booed on arrival by local people demanding
more resources to fight the fire, news reports said.
About 500 people have been evacuated from four villages
due to the blaze.
Strong winds drove the blaze quickly through resinous
pines and flames leaped up to 40 metres high, according to
witnesses.
About 150 firefighters tackled the blaze on Sunday on
the ground and from the air. As night fell, they were
cutting fire breaks to try to halt the advance of the
blaze.
Police arrested a man believed to have started another
fire close to a Repsol oil refinery in the town of
Puertollano in central Spain. That fire was under control,
a government official said.
In Zamora province, also in central Spain, a fire that
had consumed about 1,200 hectares (3,000 acres) was now
manageable, a government spokesman said.
In Madrid, an annual water fight which takes place as
part of a fiesta in the district of Vallecas went ahead on
Sunday but organisers said the battle would last half as
long as usual.
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