200K-Plus Evacuated Amid Wildfires in France, Spain

Authorities in France evacuated some suburbs of Bordeaux on Saturday as a massive wildfire shifted toward the city famous for its wines. The government mobilized soldiers to join the battle against the flames and rushed in 1.5 million face masks to protect against choking smoke, per the AP. The prefect of the Gironde region that includes Bordeaux ordered the evacuation for parts of three of the city's western suburbs, including its airport. Other towns and villages further west of the city were also ordered to evacuate, adding to the tally of 141,000 people who'd previously already been told to move in the face of two major fires in the southwestern Gironde and Landes regions.

Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu described the fires as unprecedented and said the Gironde blaze had become so strong that it was generating its own winds. "Our priority is clear: Protect human lives," he posted on X, adding that evacuation orders "must be respected without delay." He said firefighting teams were being reinforced on Saturday with the addition of hundreds of soldiers, and that breathing masks to filter out smoke particles were being rushed to the Gironde region for those exposed to the clouds of potentially noxious fumes.

All told, massive forest fires have forced the evacuation of some 200,000 people in southwestern France and central Spain, including 60,000 forced from their homes west of Madrid and the 141,000 told to move in the Gironde and Landes departments of France. The virulence of the wildfires, fueled by high temperatures and the long-term effects of climate change, caught fire crews and authorities off guard in both countries. Firefighters in Spain said the blazes spread so fast and violently that they couldn't be tackled head on. In France, some people even fled by boat when flames swept through tourist towns on the Atlantic coast.

Dozens of French firefighters have been injured, authorities said, but no deaths were reported in either country, despite the scenes of panic as townsfolk fled by car and police went door to door to tell people to leave as large plumes of smoke darkened the skies. Successive heat waves that hit unusually early and hard this year, baking Europe with record-shattering high temperatures, have turned forests and scrublands into tinderboxes. "It's quite impressive and even frightening," says one resident in the French town of Ares. "An evacuation on this scale has never happened before. All we really hope is that the firefighters can quickly get it under control." More here.