Spain and France battle wildfires as more than 200,000 evacuate

More than 200,000 people were evacuated or forced to flee as wildfires swept across Spain and France, turning summer tourism hubs and city outskirts into emergency zones. Residents and vacationers were told to leave or stay indoors as smoke spread, and Spain declared a national emergency over wildfires for the first time.

French authorities asked the European Union for help as fires raced along the Atlantic coast, including in western France near Bordeaux. Around 800 firefighters, backed by gendarmes and soldiers, were deployed west of the city. In the tourist-heavy Cap Ferret peninsula, officials ordered a total evacuation, and about 40,000 people were moved out there alone. Some evacuees in southwestern France left by boat as flames and smoke cut off normal routes.

Near Madrid, multiple fires merged into a single blaze and at least 30,000 people were evacuated. Spanish firefighters faced thick plumes of smoke as they tried to hold the line around the capital, and one blaze near Madrid was beyond their capacity to contain. Madrid regional president Isabel Díaz Ayuso called it the worst fire in the region’s history.

The fires were fed by extreme heat, dryness and strong winds, conditions that have sharpened the summer wildfire season across southern Europe. In Arès, near Cap Ferret, resident Laurent Moretti said, “It’s quite impressive and even frightening,” and said an evacuation on this scale had never happened before.