Sawt Falasteen - France forest fire wanes ahead of new heatwave

The blaze has since Wednesday last week ravaged 42,000 hectares of pine forest -- an area larger than Detroit -- in the famous wine-growing region of Bordeaux.

It has caused some 220,000 holiday makers and residents to flee at the height of the summer holidays, and destroyed around 240 homes.

In a village west of the city of Bordeaux, drizzle offered a little welcome respite to firefighters on Monday morning.

At a school in Saint-Jean d'Illac, dozens of tired firefighters ate breakfast in the canteen.

Around 40 fire fighting trucks waited to be deployed in the courtyard, next to tractors pulling water cisterns.

A firefighter told AFP he had spent the night patrolling around homes to protect them from any incoming fire, but the flames had never arrived.

"It really calmed down last night," he said, asking to remain anonymous because he was not authorised to speak to the press.

But "it can start off again at any moment," he added.

Regional firefighting official Wilfried Schneider said there were less active fire fronts on Monday than the previous day with less wind, but it was too early to say the fire had become stable.

"We still don't have the fire under control," he added.

Closer to the fire, the road was lined with smouldering pine trees and blackened trunks, as firefighting planes flew overhead.

- New heatwave -

France's fire has caused a "pyrocumulonimbus" -- a giant fire cloud that can create its own winds and packs lightning and sometimes tornadoes that can cause more blazes, according to France's national firefighters federation, who said the phenomenon had never before been seen in the country.

French President Emmanuel Macron was to hold a crisis cabinet meeting to discuss the emergency.

Finance Minister Roland Lescure said insurance companies had pledged to pay for accommodation for those displaced.

"All French insurers have committed to ensuring that everyone who has been displaced can have their rehousing costs reimbursed under the terms of their contract, whether or not their home has been damaged," he said.

The met office has forecast more hot weather in southwest France from Tuesday, with temperatures than could soar to 40C and dry wind.

"All the conditions are in place for the fire to start up again," Philippe de Gonneville, the mayor of the village of Lege-Cap-Ferret, told AFP on Monday.

France has been battered by three heatwaves since May as part of increasingly common extreme weather episodes linked to climate change, causing excess deaths, drying up rivers and fuelling wildfires.

Roaring flames in the UNESCO-listed Fontainebleau forest outside Paris earlier this month also devastated 2,000 hectares, in a rare such fire so far north.

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A.Suleiman--SF-PST