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WEATHER

Spain and Portugal battle wildfires amid heatwave alerts

Hundreds of firefighters were on Tuesday battling a wildfire that has burned for four days in Portugal, which like neighbouring Spain is sweltering in a heatwave that has triggered widespread weather alerts.

Published: 8 August 2023 16:10 CEST
Spain and Portugal battle wildfires amid heatwave alerts
Firefighters battle a wildfire in Carrascal, Proenca a Nova on August 6, 2023. More than 1,000 firefighters battled a wildfire in central Portugal today as officials warned that thousands of hectares were at risk amid soaring temperatures across the country. (Photo by Patricia DE MELO MOREIRA / AFP)

The Iberian Peninsula is bearing the brunt of climate change in Europe, witnessing increasingly intense heatwaves, droughts and wildfires.

The temperature rose to 46.4 degrees Celsius (115.5 degrees Fahrenheit) in Santarem, central Portugal, on Monday – a record for 2023 — according to provisional data from the meteorological office.

Some areas of Portugal were forecasts to hit 40C on Tuesday.

The met office in Spain said the heat there was expected to top 44C on Tuesday and Wednesday, which is predicted to be the fiercest day of this heatwave, the third this year.

On Tuesday, around 900 firefighters backed by 10 water-bomber planes were battling a blaze that has already burned thousands of hectares in Odemira, southwestern Portugal, near the southern tourist mecca of the Algarve.

Portugal’s civil protection authority said the perimeter of the wildfire had been “stabilised” overnight on Monday but there were still “two critical points” that required “a lot of effort”.

Some 20 inland villages and a number of rural tourist sites were evacuated on Monday, bringing the number displaced since Saturday to 1,500.

Around 40 people, including 28 fire officers, have been given emergency medical treatment.

A separate wildfire that has already destroyed around 7,000 hectares (17,300 acres) in Leiria, central Portugal, calmed somewhat overnight on Monday.

Across the country, nearly 2,800 firefighters and 16 water-bombers were in action on Tuesday.

Weather warnings remained in place in both Portugal and Spain.

Much of the southern half of Spain was on orange alert on Tuesday.

The Spanish met office (AEMET) issued maximum red alerts for parts of Andalusia in the south, the Madrid region in the centre and the Basque Country in the far north.

More than 1,000 hectares of land were destroyed by flames in Spain over the weekend.

A fourth large wildfire broke out on Monday in Extremadura, central Spain, near the border with Portugal. Firefighters were unable to contain it overnight.

Another fire caused by fireworks broke out in Calpe in Alicante province on Sunday, destroying the site of the town’s Roman baths. 

In total, wildfires have destroyed 100,000 hectares of land across the Iberian Peninsula this year, according to preliminary estimates. This is on top of the record 400,000 hectares destroyed last year.

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CLIMATE CRISIS

‘Far hotter than normal’: Spain set for scorching summer after rainy June

Rainy periods have marked June so far in parts of the country, but Spain’s meteorological agency has warned that it could still have one the hottest summers on record.

Published: 20 June 2024 09:43 CEST
'Far hotter than normal': Spain set for scorching summer after rainy June

Spain could be set for a “far hotter than normal” summer this year, with experts predicting that it could be one of the hottest on record. This is according to forecasts by Spain’s state meteorological agency (Aemet).

Aemet spokesman Rubén del Campo stated that “there’s a high probability that temperatures will be much higher than normal and that this summer will be among the hottest 20 percent on historical record.”

READ ALSO: 2023 was second-hottest year on record in Spain

He added that the probability of a scorching summer is between 70-100 percent in most of Spain, and that the unusually warm weather could be felt most in the northern half of the peninsula, as well as the eastern Canary Islands.

Aemet posted some weather forecast maps to its X/Twitter account in recent days, with the entirety of the Spanish mainland and islands covered in dark red, meaning a high probability of abnormally high temperatures. “The high probability” of a heatwave, it said, “extends to the rest of southern Europe and northern Africa.”

This follows something of a stop-start June with rainy periods in many parts of the country. Del Campo admitted that so far “it seems that the summer hasn’t started” because temperatures are “slightly” lower than normal for the time of year, but stressed that Aemet forecast models predict that the intense heat will not take long to arrive. 

A marked rise in temperatures is expected for this weekend, although they could drop again next week before going up again as high summer approaches, according to forecasts.

With regards to rainfall, it seems it will likely also be a dry summer with little rain. Del Campo predicted “a summer with less rain than usual, especially in the north and inland peninsula”, where there is a 50-60 percent probability of rainfall below historical averages for the time of year:  “The most likely scenario is that of a quarter with less rainfall than usual,” he added.

Though an unusually wet Easter period helped to refill some of Spain’s dwindling reservoir reserves, a long period of dry weather will likely worsen Spain’s ongoing drought conditions. The problem is particularly bad in Catalonia and Andalusia.

READ ALSO: Will drought restrictions affect summer holidays in Spain?

Looking back on spring temperatures, Aemet data shows that it was also one of the warmest on record. Del Campo stressed that it was “the eighth warmest spring of the 21st century and the tenth since the start of the historical series in 1961.”

The average temperature during spring was 13.1C, which is 0.7C above average values for the 1991-2020 period. “Eight of the ten warmest springs on record have been recorded since 2006, further evidence of climate change,” Del Campo said.

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