Firefighters have brought a huge wildfire sweeping across central Portugal under control. But with the risk of further outbreaks high, the country has been placed on alert.
Image: Getty Images/AFP/P. De Melo Moreira
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Portugal has issued a fire alert for Monday and Tuesday amid hot conditions, as more than 800 firefighters successfully fought a huge wildfire blazing across central regions of the country.
The country' meteorology agency, IPMA, said the risk of fire was elevated in most of the country, with temperatures of 37 degrees Celsius (99 F) in some regions. The alert puts firefighters, police and emergency medical services in increased readiness, and there is a ban on lighting fires along with limits on forest access.
The government says more than 12,000 firefighters are on standby, backed by 60 water bombers.
A firefighter tries to extinguish a wildfire in Vale da CubaImage: Getty Images/AFP/P. De Melo Moreira
Several injured
The alert, the second in 10 days, comes as a wildfire raging in the municipality of Oleiros and two neighboring municipalities over the past two days was brought under control on Monday morning.
The fire had forced a number of people to evacuate their homes and endangered houses as it approached isolated villages.
A 21-year-old firefighter was killed in a road accident on Saturday while fighting the fire. Several other people were injured in the crash.
Two other firefighters have already been killed this summer in the course of their work.
Two major blazes in the country three years ago claimed the lives of 106 people.
2019: Year of wildfires
Wildfires have raged around the world throughout 2019, laying waste to plants, animals and trees that store carbon — as well as human homes and lives.
Image: Reuters/S. N. Bikes
The lungs of the Earth burn
The world's largest rainforest was ablaze for weeks in 2019, burning at a rate not seen in years. Between January and August, there was an 82% increase in fires in the Brazilian Amazon compared to the same time period last year, and August itself saw more than 30,000 fires reported. Most are thought to have been lit by farmers clearing land for crops and cattle.
Image: REUTERS
Biodiversity ablaze
The Amazon wasn't the only region in Brazil on fire this year. There were even more fires in the Cerrado savannah in the country's south. One of the most biodiverse areas of the world, Cerrado is also one of the most endangered. About half its green areas have already been lost, mostly to soy farming, but the savannah is also very vulnerable to fire.
Image: DW/J. Velozo
Orangutans burned out of home
Month-long wildfires in the Indonesian regions of Sumatra and Borneo destroyed more than 40,000 hectares this year. Already-endangered orangutans were killed, those that survived have a vastly reduced habitat. The carbon-rich peat under the forest's roots makes these fires particularly hard to extinguish — and dangerous for the climate: 700 million tons of CO2 were released into the atmosphere.
Image: REUTERS
Tropical wetlands burn dry
The world's largest tropical wetlands, the Pantanal, also went up in flames this year. The Pantanal is located mostly in Brazil but extends to Bolivia and Paraguay. The number of fires there broke all records this year, with over 8,000 registered. Some 1.2 million hectares of forest were destroyed in Bolivia alone. Scientists called it the country's biggest disaster ever for biodiversity.
Image: Getty Images/AFP/A. Raldes
California bushfires wreak havoc
Bushfires ravaged the US state of California this year. They were caused by sparks emitted from old infrastructure, fanned by hot and dry winds and accelerated by the dry conditions in the region and quickly turned into an inferno, destroying homes and land, killing three people, forcing tens of thousands to evacuate and leaving almost a million people without power.
Image: Imago Images/ZUMA Press/H. Gutknecht
Even the Arctic blazes
Even within the Arctic circle, fires were burning this year. In Siberia, hundreds of fires over three months destroyed more than 4 million hectares of forest, creating a cloud of soot and ash as large as the entire EU, and Russian military had to be deployed. Across Alaska, there were 400 wildfires this year. Greenland and Canada didn't escape the blaze either.
Image: Imago Images/ITAR-TASS
Bushfires kill koalas
Australia saw unprecedented bushfires this year that burned at a particularly high intensity. Drought, searing temperatures and dry winds saw more than a million hectares burned, taking the lives of four people and up to 1,000 koalas. Koalas are considered vulnerable to extinction and this year's bushfires put the future of the slow and helpless animals even more in danger.
