More than 160,000 flee out-of-control wildfires in France, Spain

France and Spain evacuated more than 160,000 people as unprecedented forest fires ravaged areas on Saturday near Madrid and Bordeaux, a French city flanked by tourist havens and world-renowned vineyards. French President Emmanuel Macron asked the army on Friday to mobilise to help contain the worst wildfire the country has ever seen after seeking European Union help, as a local official warned the blaze was heading towards Bordeaux. Authorities ordered the evacuation of towns near Bordeaux “as a precaution” against the approaching inferno, while traffic information website Bison Fute urged drivers to avoid roads in the area to free up access for emergency services.

Around 44,000 people fled the up-market Cap Ferret peninsula south of Bordeaux, with the only road threatened by flames. Boats moved hundreds of people away from the fires, while others drove off the peninsula, known for its millionaire residences. More than 50 houses there have been destroyed.

At least 141,000 people have been evacuated in southwestern France and 25,000 in the Madrid region, among them more than 1,200 elderly and disabled people, French and Spanish officials said. Madrid and Paris have called in EU help as flames whipped up by strong winds and boosted by drought tore through tinder-dry forests. French Interior Minister Laurent Nunez said France had never before seen such fires on this scale and pledged to “do everything” to protect Bordeaux.

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Carlos Novillo, the Madrid regional government’s emergency management chief, said the wildfire near the capital was “at its peak and is currently beyond the capacity of firefighters to contain”. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez will go to the zone early Saturday to visit the emergency coordination centre there.

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