Raging forest fires in Spain have so far destroyed 149,298 hectare, over three times as much as the same period last year, when 43,915 hectare was wiped out. This according to Spain’s Ministry of Agriculture.
In all, this year has seen 11,652 fires, of which 7,576 less than 1 ha and 4,076 over 1 ha in size. 29 of these fires were exceptionally large: over 500 hectare went up in flames in each of these. Not included in these data were recent fires like the one in La Gomera, and the one in Castrocontrigo, León (both over 10,000 ha); nor the ones in Solana, Avila and Aras (each over 1,000 ha).
The total percentage of burned terrain has so far reached 0.540%. In the whole of 2011, this was 0.159%. Of the 2012 percentage, 87,070 ha was forest, 56,092 was semi-wooded and 6,136 consisted of meadows and farmlands.
It was the North-East of Spain that suffered the most from the fires, with 49.5% of the incidents. The interior is next, with 33.3% followed by the regions close to the Mediterranean with 16.5%.
Source: Europa Press