Thousands crowd shelters as wildfires force mass evacuations in France and Spain

Thousands crowded into emergency shelters across France and Spain on Sunday as wildfires forced more than 300,000 people to flee their homes and holiday accommodation. The blazes have destroyed houses and triggered one of the largest peacetime evacuation operations France has ever carried out. Major fires are still burning in both countries, with authorities warning of another difficult night ahead.

How many people have been evacuated in France and Spain?

More than 300,000 people have fled the wildfires in France and Spain combined. In Gironde, France, over 200,000 residents and tourists were evacuated, while Spain evacuated 60,000 people from villages west of Madrid. Fresh evacuations were ordered near Bordeaux and Madrid as fire conditions worsened over the weekend.

One person was killed in eastern Spain, and authorities ordered new evacuations around Bordeaux and the Spanish capital as officials braced for another difficult night. Families slept on camp beds in exhibition halls and gymnasiums after fleeing walls of smoke and flames that swept through forests and tourist areas. Many residents and holidaymakers remained uncertain whether they would be able to return home.

"We were told: 'You have to evacuate'," said Frederic Tavitian, 70, who spent the night at Bordeaux's exhibition centre, now converted into a vast emergency shelter. "We saw columns of smoke, like a volcano about to erupt." Around 5,000 to 6,000 displaced people spent the night at that centre alone.

According to the Gironde fire service, the blaze generated a rare "pyrocumulonimbus" cloud, creating its own winds and whirlwinds. This made the fire "erratic and unmanageable," firefighter Captain Nicolas Braz told AFP. Spanish authorities meanwhile ordered new evacuations near Toledo, southwest of Madrid.

"Today we are rather more pessimistic than we were yesterday," Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska told reporters on Saturday. "The weather conditions have not helped at all," he added.

What damage have the wildfires caused?

Overstretched firefighters battling around the clock for days have struggled to contain the infernos, which claimed the lives of two French firefighters near Bordeaux this week. A separate wildfire near the eastern Spanish city of Valencia killed one person on Saturday before firefighters brought it under control.

France initially moved 197,000 people from areas around the popular vacation spot of Bordeaux, one of the country's biggest peacetime evacuations, though 3,000 people were later allowed to return. "It is devastation," said Matthieu Plessis, 40, describing the smouldering ruins of his house in Gironde. "It was still there yesterday evening. It burned during the night."

A further 55,000 people were ordered to leave late Saturday, bringing the total evacuated from Gironde alone to more than 200,000, authorities said. In Spain, where 60,000 people were evacuated from villages west of Madrid, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said the priority was "to save lives." At least eight municipalities near Toledo were later ordered to evacuate.

In the Spanish town of Brunete, west of Madrid, mayor Mar Nicolas told AFP she was "very worried." "Every year there are fires, but this one has been tremendous," she said. "It is a catastrophe."

What is causing the wildfires in France and Spain?

The fires advanced rapidly through tinderbox conditions worsened by successive heatwaves since May. Scientists say global warming is increasing droughts and making weather emergencies more extreme and frequent, and Europe is the fastest-warming continent because of climate change.

Both countries received EU assistance, including firefighting aircraft from other member states. France deployed 1,500 soldiers to support the firefighting effort near Bordeaux and, on Saturday, used an A400M military transport aircraft to drop water and fire retardant on the blaze. Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu said 1,400 firefighters in total were tackling the fires.

Local authorities set up emergency shelters in schools and gymnasiums for tourists and residents left wondering what they would return to. Nuala Kelly, a 75-year-old Irish tourist, said she had never seen anything like it. "Never, never, never, never, never, and I've travelled all over the world and been in all sorts of situations," she told AFP at Bordeaux's exhibition centre, now housing thousands of people.

Olivier Stewart, a 38-year-old Frenchman who had to leave the village of Merignac with his wife and young children, said the children were "the most stressed." "They think the fire is going to burn down the house, but we're coping," he said. Sunday's final stage of the Tour de France was shortened after the interior ministry said security personnel assigned to the race were needed on the fire front instead.

How much land have the wildfires burned?

Smoke plumes from the French and Spanish fires were beginning to merge in the atmosphere, according to Spain's Aemet weather agency. Fires across France have burned nearly 98,000 hectares, which Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez called a "historic record."

In southwestern France alone, the flames have consumed more than 32,000 hectares, more than three times the area of Paris, and destroyed at least 100 buildings. The blazes west of Madrid have burned up to 25,000 hectares, according to Spain's interior ministry. Two of the three major wildfires there have merged and are threatening to join another blaze, raising fears of a vast inferno just kilometers from the Spanish capital.