“The fire is out of control, the outlook is not positive,” Canary Islands President Fernando Clavijo said at a press conference in Santa Cruz. “Our goal for tonight is to stop the fire from advancing. It was a very tough day. We will conduct operations to protect residents’ property,” he added.
The fire broke out in the national park near the volcano El Teide. The difficult terrain with steep ravines makes the work of the fire brigade more difficult. Some 250 firefighters and 13 helicopters and planes were deployed on Wednesday to fight the blaze, Clavijo said.
About 1,800 hectares have already gone up in flames, according to the president. The villages of Arrate, Chivisaya, Media Montana, Ajafona and Las Lagunetas were evacuated as a precaution on Wednesday morning because of the dense smoke. A dog shelter has also been preventively evacuated. Authorities have closed the roads leading to the mountains in the northeast of the island.
The fire in Tenerife follows a heat wave that left many areas in the Canary Islands dry. Today, heat waves due to global warming from human activities are no longer uncommon, as predicted by climate projections and reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Heat waves will become more frequent and more intense and their impact will be greater.
LOOK. Villages evacuated due to forest fire in Tenerife