There was a “very high risk” of wildfire in seven départements in southern France, Météo-France said as it placed an additional département on red alert on Sunday. According to Météo-France, a red alert level warning indicates that “weather conditions mean there is a very high risk of wildfires starting and spreading compared to summer norms”. The affected areas are Aude, Bouches-du-Rhône, Gard, Hérault, Pyrénées-Orientales, Vaucluse, Hérault, Pyrénées-Orientales, and Drôme, which was added on Sunday. New fire breaks out In the Pyrénées-Orientales, a new large fire
broke out on Saturday in a hard-to-reach area, burning 930 hectares overnight and mobilising more than 580 firefighters, BMFTV reported. However, the fire was “no longer spreading unchecked” and had decreased in intensity, Pierre Regnault de la Mothe, the top département official, said at a press briefing on Sunday morning. “Families in isolated locations were evacuated throughout the night. No casualties have been reported at this stage,” Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez wrote on X on Saturday. Meanwhile, a fire in the Gard that had been
contained on Saturday flared up again overnight, the broadcaster reported. Forty firefighters were deployed to the new fire in Milhaud, in the Cante-Perdrix neighbourhood. The prefecture is urging people to avoid the area and not to evacuate until instructed to do so by the authorities. Another major fire that broke out on Saturday, this time in Rochefort-du-Gard in Gard, has now been contained but has destroyed 50 hectares. In Drôme, however, a fire that has already incinerated at least 125 hectares of forest in the
last two days, is continuing to burn. The fire’s advance has been slowed by 300 firefighters on site and several aircraft dropping water and fire-retardants. However, it is in an uninhabited mountainous area that is very difficult to access. The prefecture said it would “take several more days” to fully extinguish it due to very strong winds. READ ALSO: MAP: How to get the latest wildfire information and alerts in France Fire season started ‘a month early’ There were also 21 départements on orange alert
– the second highest level warning – on Sunday. According to Météo-France an orange alert means: “weather conditions significantly increase the risk of forest and vegetation fires starting and then spreading compared to normal summer conditions. The fire risk may be very high in some areas.” This comes as Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez said on Friday that he was “very concerned” that the fire season had started in France “a month earlier” than usual. “We are very concerned about the season; we are a month
ahead of schedule in terms of fires breaking out,” he said, noting that 26 simultaneous fires had, for example, been recorded across mainland France on Thursday. Nonetheless, Nuñez sought to reassure the public that France has “sufficient resources” to fight the fires, listing in particular the 12 Canadair and eight Dash aircraft in the fire-fighting air fleet, as well as the 10 water-bombing helicopters and six light water-bombing aircraft that have been additionally chartered. On Monday, the number of départements on red alert is set
to decrease to three (Gard, Vaucluse, Drôme) with the number on orange alert expected to rise to 25 accordingly, according to Météo-France. However, temperatures are forecast to remain high across the country. READ ALSO: Do heatwaves cause wildfires in France? Heatwave alert extended The forecaster has also extended the orange heatwave alert to seven départements from midday on Sunday, most of which are the same as those at risk of fire. This is Météo-France’s second-highest weather warning level, signifying dangerous conditions that require the public
to be “extremely vigilant”. Ardèche, Aude, Drôme, Gard, Hérault, Pyrénées-Orientales, and Vaucluse will join Hérault and Pyrénées-Orientales, which were already under an orange alert on Saturday. The alert will remain in effect on Monday too. The forecaster said it expected “intense heat to spread to the southwest” on Sunday afternoon with maximum temperatures ranging from 35C to 37C, and peaks of 38 – 40C in the former Languedoc-Roussillon region. On Monday, the intense heat was forecast to move northward, according to
Météo-France, which said the orange heatwave alert could be extended to include further départements. Temperatures hit record highs in France in June. The exceptional June heatwave also led to an almost-30-percent increase in the number of deaths nationwide, France’s public health agency said on Friday.
Météo-France, wildfire alerts, red alert, orange alert, heatwave, south of France, Pyrénées-Orientales, Gard, Drôme, Vaucluse, Hérault, Aude, Bouches-du-Rhône, Ardèche