SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Canary Islands, 20 Aug: Canary Islands regional President Fernando Clavijo said Sunday that police have confirmed that a wildfire raging on the Spanish tourist island of Tenerife was started deliberately.
\nClavijo said police had opened three lines of investigation but did not say if there had been any arrests.
\nImproved weather conditions helped firefighters make advances overnight in their battle to tame the blaze that has raged out of control for the past five days, authorities said Sunday.
\n\u201cThe night was very difficult but thanks to the work of the firefighters, the results have been very positive,\u201d Tenerife governor Rosa D\u00e1vila said at a news conference.
\nThe Canary Islands have been in drought for most of the past few years, just like most of mainland Spain. The islands have recorded below-average rainfall in recent years because of changing weather patterns impacted by climate change.
\nAlthough the blaze in the northeast of the island is not near the main tourist areas in the southwest, the regional government ordered the evacuation of a state-run hotel in the Teide volcano national park, in central Tenerife, some 50 kilometers (30 miles) southwest of the fire zone. It was not immediately clear how many peope were staying at the hotel.
\nD\u00e1vila said that more than 12,000 people have been evacuated from their homes since the fire started Tuesday. Up to Saturday, more than 8,000 hectares (20,000 acres) of pine forest had been burned, but D\u00e1vila said that figure was likely to be much higher Sunday.
\nNo injuries have yet been reported and D\u00e1vila said that thanks to the firefighters no houses have been burned so far.
\nThe fire, described as the worst in Tenerife in decades, is threatening 11 town areas flanking a steep and craggy mountain area. Access for firefighters is extremely difficult.
\nThe emergency services said air quality in 19 town areas was not good and urged people to stay indoors when possible and wear masks outdoors. AP<\/p>\n
More than 400 firefighters and soldiers have been deployed, as well as 23 water-carrying helicopters and planes.
\nSpain\u2019s mainland is bracing for another heat wave starting Sunday that will last until Thursday. Spain\u2019s state weather service said temperatures would gradually rise to hit 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) in parts of the mainland Wednesday and Thursday.
\nOn Tenerife, the agency predicted maximum temperatures averaging 30 C (86F) for the coming week.
\nMore than 2,000 people were evacuated in a wildfire on the nearby La Palma island last month that affected some 4,500 hectares (11,000 acres).
\nAccording to the European Forest Fire Information System, Spain heads the list of EU countries affected by wildfires so far this year, with 75,000 hectares (185,000 acres) burned, ahead of Italy and Greece.
\nSpain accounted for almost 40% of the nearly 800,00 hectares (2 million acres) burned in the European Union in 2022, the EU agency said.
\nThe seven Canary Islands are located off the northwest coast of Africa and southwest of mainland Spain. At their nearest point, they are 100 kilometers (60 miles) from Morocco. AP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Canary Islands, 20 Aug: Canary Islands regional President Fernando Clavijo said Sunday that police have confirmed that a wildfire raging on the Spanish tourist island of Tenerife was started deliberately. Clavijo said police had opened three lines of investigation but did not say if there had been any arrests. Improved weather […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-222671","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222671","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222671"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222671\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}