Europe is burning : How bad could this wildfire crisis get?
Wildfires are sweeping across Spain and France, leaving a trail of destroyed homes, scorched forests and mass evacuations. With temperatures expected to rise this week, other southern countries are at risk.
Europe is facing one of its worst wildfire seasons in years, with France and Spain bearing the brunt of large, fast-moving blazes fuelled by repeated heatwaves, drought and strong winds.
Thousands of firefighters are battling fires that have forced mass evacuations, destroyed tens of thousands of hectares of forest and disrupted tourism during the peak summer season.
Portugal, Greece, Italy, Turkey and parts of the Western Balkans are also at risk due to expected rising temperatures.
Euronews has examined the latest wildfire trends, the factors driving their spread and the challenges Europe faces in preventing future disasters.
Where are the wildfires hitting the most?
Active since 22 July, wildfires are currently concentrated in southwestern France as well as in central and eastern Spain.
The worst-affected areas include western Madrid, where authorities are tackling one of the region’s largest fires on record, as well as Ávila, Toledo and Castellón on Spain’s eastern coast, where an uncontrolled blaze is still burning.
"The scale of the disaster we are living through is very hard to accept," said Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on 26 July.
In France, the Gironde region around Bordeaux is Europe's biggest wildfire hotspot. French authorities have described it as the country's worst wildfire emergency in decades, with President Emmanuel Macron calling it the worst since World War II.
"In Gironde, we are continuing to fight. The fire has been stabilised, as we say, but it remains very intense... We are doing everything we can to stop it," Macron told reporters.
What has been destroyed so far?
The destruction has been extensive and is still being assessed as fires continue to burn. So far, at least 80,000 hectares have been lost to the fires in Spain and 42,000 in France.
Two firefighters died in France and another died in Italy while working to tackle wildfires.
At least 240 homes have been completely destroyed, with many more damaged, near Bordeaux, in Le Porge.
More than 320,000 people have been evacuated across Spain and France. In France, authorities ordered nearly 4,000 additional residents and tourists to leave coastal areas along the Atlantic on Tuesday as a precautionary measure.
How is the European Union helping?
The European Union's main tool is the EU Civil Protection Mechanism (EUCPM), a solidarity system through which member states and participating countries share firefighting resources when national capacities are overwhelmed.
When a country requests assistance, the European Commission's Emergency Response Coordination Centre (ERCCC) coordinates offers of aircraft, helicopters and firefighting teams from across Europe, as well as co-financing their transport and, in some cases, operational costs.
For this wildfire season, the European Commission, through its rescEU mechanism linked to the EUCPM maintains a transitional firefighting fleet of 22 aircraft and five helicopters, which can be deployed to countries facing major fires.
The Commission deployed more than 770 firefighters from 14 countries across high-risk areas in Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, Greece and Cyprus to improve preparedness and facilitate the exchange of firefighting expertise.
It also created a dedicated Wildfire Support Team within the ERCC to monitor wildfire risks around the clock and coordinate responses during the fire season.
So far, the EU's civil mechanism supported France with two small Air Tractor firefighting planes from Portugal, one Black Hawk helicopter from Slovakia and another one from Czechia which arrived at the Bordeaux-Mérignac airport on 24 July.
One Croatian Canadair firefighting plane arrived in Nîmes on 24 July, followed by two Swedish water-scooping planes and a technical team in Bordeaux-Mérignac on 25 July. A European Commission liaison officer was deployed to Bordeaux on 24 July.
The EU's Copernicus service is also providing emergency satellite maps of the affected areas.
Spain received two Greek and two Italian Canadair firefighting planes in Torrejón de Ardoz on 25 July, along with two Turkish Air Tractor planes and three Portuguese ground firefighting teams (134 personnel, 41 vehicles) in Burgohondo.
Two helicopters were due to be deployed on Tuesday from Germany as well as two additional planes from Türkiye.
How much worse can it get?
Europe has experienced three major heatwaves this summer, leaving vegetation exceptionally dry.
Another spell of high temperatures is forecast this week, raising concerns that new fires could ignite and existing ones could spread rapidly.
Although authorities in Gironde and Nouvelle-Aquitaine said the wildfire, which has ravaged 42,000 hectares of vegetation in less than a week, remained “contained” on Tuesday, they warned that weather conditions were expected to remain unfavourable, particularly due to rising temperatures, according to French newspaper Le Monde.
Portugal, Greece, Italy, Turkey and parts of the Western Balkans are also at risk due to the expected rising temperatures.
However, Commission officials said that emergency response alone will not be enough as climate change makes wildfires larger and more intense.
During a private briefing, they argued that Europe needs an integrated management approach, combining firefighting with prevention measures such as better forest management and reducing combustible vegetation in landscapes to lower the risk and intensity of future fires.
Scientists said the combination of prolonged heat and drought has created ideal wildfire conditions across southern Europe.
Are humans responsible?
While the extreme weather conditions driving the fires are strongly linked to climate change, many individual wildfires are still started by human activity.
According to the Commission, around 96% of wildfires in Europe are caused by human activity, either accidentally or deliberately. Causes could range from discarded cigarettes, barbecues and campfires to sparks from machinery, power lines or arson.
French Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez stated recently that nine out of ten wildfires are caused by human activity, with over 110 suspected arsonists arrested nationwide amid severe summer blazes.
In Portugal, arson was the cause of 84% of the area burned in 2024, with estimated damage to the forest at €67 million, according to official data.
