This heat wave, which started last weekend and is expected to last at least until Sunday, is resulting in suffocating temperatures throughout the country, particularly in the regions of Andalusia (south), Extremadura (south -west) and Galicia (north-west), placed on red alert, according to the Spanish meteorological agency (Aemet).
Apart from the Canary archipelago, all the other Spanish regions have been placed on alert at lower degrees.
A maximum of 45.6°C was recorded at 5:30 p.m. (3:30 p.m. GMT) in Almonte (south) in Andalusia, while several cities in the south exceeded 44°C, such as Seville, Cordoba or Badajoz.
Thursday should be “the peak of this heat wave”, according to Aemet, with temperatures expected to reach 44°C again in part of the center and south of the country.
Due to this heat wave, coupled with the lack of rainfall in the Iberian Peninsula since the beginning of the year, an “extreme” risk of fire exists throughout the country, according to the fire prevention and extinguishing services. of forest.
At least 3,500 hectares have already burned in a mountainous region straddling the regions of Extremadura and Castile and Leon, not far from Portugal. The firefighters, who worked all night, nevertheless managed to “stabilize” the fire, according to regional authorities.
North-west of Madrid, nearly 500 residents have been temporarily evacuated due to another fire, also in the process of being controlled, according to the regional emergency services.
Between January 1 and July 3, 70,354 hectares of forest went up in smoke in Spain, almost double (+87%) the average of the last ten years, according to the government.
The proliferation of these phenomena is a direct consequence of global warming, with greenhouse gas emissions increasing in intensity, duration and frequency, the scientists explain.
Including the current heat wave, Spain has gone through five episodes of exceptionally high temperatures over the past eleven months. The month of May had notably been the hottest there since the beginning of the century.
In addition to the heat, Spain has suffered from a severe lack of precipitation since this winter. As a result, the level of water reservoirs was Wednesday at 44.4% of their total capacity, against an average of 65.7% over this period over the past ten years, the authorities point out.