Portugal and Spain swelter in heatwave, wildfire risk grows

Rising temperatures in Portugal led authorities to place more then half of the country on red alert Tuesday and to deploy hundreds upon hundreds of firefighters to fight blazes erupting throughout the central region during a heatwave that also swept across Spain.

Strong winds caused a major wildfire to rekindle last week in Santarem, north Lisbon. It was causing temperatures of over 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit). Another fire broke out nearby, causing the closure of two major highways linking Lisbon and Porto.

According to civil protection, around 1,600 firefighters were supported by 430 vehicles, 25 aircraft, and were responding to 19 active blazes. The red alert, which is the highest level of weather warning, was issued.

Authorities said that Spain's neighboring Spain was also at risk from wildfires. The main concern was in Extremadura and Castille, Leon, and Leon. Orense, a northwestern province in the United States, was placed on alert due to high temperatures of 42 C.

Edison Vladimir, a 42-year-old delivery man in Madrid, said that "it is indeed a season of more heat than other year... it's difficult".

People were cooling off in the Portuguese capital which is crowded with tourists. They were drinking water, eating ice-cream, and heading to the riverside or to the nearby beaches.

A British couple and their child enjoyed the morning sun on a small beach near the Tagus river.

Megan Slancey, 28, said that she had been keeping an eye on the weather conditions before arriving.

The Met Office in Britain has issued an extreme heat alert as temperatures continue to rise this week and next week in large parts of England and Wales.

Clare Nullis spoke on Tuesday at a U.N. briefing that the heatwave in Europe, which was Europe's second this summer, was mostly affecting Portugal and Spain. However, it was likely to spread.

Nullis stated that "it is affecting large areas of Europe and it will intensify".

According to U.N. reports, extreme wildfires will increase by 30% in the next 28 year due to human-caused climate changes.

Paul de Almeida (a 51-year-old South African visitor to Lisbon) said, "You can definitely see that it has changed over these last few years." It is imperative that we take action to fix it.

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