Sawt Falasteen - France and Spain battle 'unpredictable' wildfires as 300,000 evacuated

The forest infernos, raging for days unchecked in France's southwest and in central Spain near Madrid, were among the worst each nation has seen in peacetime.

France's major fire remained unchecked and volatile -- driven by gusts that in some cases were generated by the turbulent blazes themselves.

Spanish officials, however, voiced optimism they were starting to get a grip on some fires -- though on the weekend they were confronted with a new fire front, near the eastern coastal city of Valencia, which forced 15,000 people to flee.

"Difficult hours lie ahead admittedly," Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said as he visited the fire zone in Avila province west of Madrid, though he pointed to some "positive" indications towards containment.

Other EU countries have been sending help to Spain and France in the form of aircraft, fire crews and vehicles.

Scientists say that such weather emergencies are being made more extreme and frequent by climate change.

The disasters, coming at the peak of the summer vacation period when tourists flock to both countries, were fuelled by woodlands parched to tinder by successive heatwaves and lack of rain since May.

"When we flew into Madrid we could see the fire very close to the airport," said Pilar, a 69-year-old New Zealand tourist. She said she was carrying a mask in case the smoke situation in the city became worse.

Letisha Lucas, a 33-year-old tourist from Canada -- which has its own wildfires happening -- said the smoke smell was immediately obvious on arrival in Madrid "and very irritating on the throat". She added that the proximity of the blaze left her "kind of nervous".

- 'Extremely intense' fire -

France's Interior Minister Laurent Nunez warned "the situation remains very unfavourable" for fires across the country, where 250,000 people had been evacuated.

The main fire in the southwest Gironde region, where Bordeaux is located, was "extremely intense and unpredictable... generating its own winds and advancing erratically toward the Bordeaux metropolitan area", he said on X.

Hundreds of homes have been destroyed in surrounding areas, but Bordeaux's mayor said there were no plans to evacuate the urban area, home to 850,000 people and currently sheltering thousands evacuated from zones close by.

Though the fire was 15 kilometres (nine miles) from Bordeaux's suburbs, it "is largely to the south. It is not advancing on the western side," said the mayor, Thomas Cazenave, adding that local officials remained "vigilant".

Some 2,500 firefighters, including a Swiss firefighting team, 1,500 military personnel and around 1,200 police have been deployed to the Gironde region.

Police said a patrol in Eysines, a largely evacuated outlying suburb of Bordeaux, had on Saturday arrested a man who allegedly stole 44 bottles of prestige grand cru wine from an empty home.

France has evacuated 250,000 people from at-risk areas, mostly in the Gironde region but also in the adjoining Landes region, where another wildfire was "better contained but not yet stopped", according to authorities.

- King decries damage -

In Spain, King Felipe VI, visiting an emergency shelter for evacuees on Madrid's western outskirts, said the wildfires had caused "incalculable" damage to his country's natural heritage.

Around 75,000 residents have been evacuated from the Madrid region, Avila, Toledo and from the eastern region of Castellon in Valencia.

Olga Congacha, 50, who had to flee her village of Robledo de Chavela west of Madrid with hastily grabbed documents and clothes, told AFP she felt "panicked" when told to leave her home.

"I didn't know whether to cry or what. It was a moment when you feel awful," she said.

She added she was allowed a brief visit to her house Sunday to get medicine, to find it covered in ash and the streets deserted.

Authorities said winds were pushing the wildfires near Madrid to the south, away from the capital for now, but forcing more evacuations of villages in their path.

Hundreds of kilometres away, the new Valencia fire was proving "very intense", Pilar Bernabe, the central government delegate to Valencia wrote on X.

"Weather conditions are expected to deteriorate as the day progresses, so these hours are being used to battle the flames," she said.

On Saturday, one person was killed near Valencia in a separate, smaller fire.

That was the only civilian death so far reported in the wildfires. In France the death toll was two firefighters killed near Bordeaux on Tuesday.

burs-rmb/gv

C.Hamad--SF-PST