Natural

Climatic conditions and high temperatures increase the risk of wildfires in large areas of the country. But what also grow and spread are clichés, lies, and misinformation. There are those who like to heat up the atmosphere with false news, many of them with political intent. In this context, it is common for false or misleading messages to proliferate, generating confusion, social alarm, and distrust towards institutions. To prevent this, it is crucial to debunk the most common myths about wildfires. This is a ranking of some of these myths.

Josefina Maestre, an RNE journalist, was a first-row witness to the origin of the forest fire caused on the San Martin de Valdeiglesias road (Madrid), where a burning vehicle caused the fire that spread from the hillside to the mountain to become one of the worst disasters.

The Government delegate in Castilla y León, Nicanor Sen, has expressed his concern about the possibility that the large fires that remain active in the province of Ávila and in the Community of Madrid could merge, something for which he said “it’s very close”.

Wildfires are proving to be especially lethal again this year after two years of above-average rainfall that fostered lush vegetation which, upon drying in spring, ended up as fuel for the flames. More than half of Spain has been subjected so far this summer to high or extreme fire risk conditions, coinciding with a series of heatwaves that have created a terrible breeding ground that has overwhelmed the capacities of extinction teams.

The red alert (extraordinary health risk due to heat) will besiege areas of the southeast of the country this Thursday and, more specifically, the southern coast of Valencia and Alicante, as well as the Vega del Segura and the Guadalentín Valley, Lorca and Águilas, in Murcia, with temperatures ranging between 42 and 44°C. Extreme heat will mainly affect the peninsular east with high temperature warnings in eleven autonomous communities, with six of them on orange alert (significant danger) and five on yellow alert, according to the State Meteorological Agency (Aemet).

The La Mierla fire (Guadalajara), which is already the largest recorded in Castilla-La Mancha having burned at least 30,000 hectares, has affected approximately a quarter of the Sierra Norte Natural Park. This protected area is one of the jewels of Castilla-La Mancha’s nature, an enclave of valuable forests and a habitat for wolves. Declared a natural park in 2011, this mountain range occupies 116,953 hectares in the northwest of the province of Guadalajara across 35 municipalities.

Spain will suffer its third heatwave this week so far this summer. Three episodes of very high temperatures in just six weeks. Faced with this unusual streak, some meteorologists are starting to talk about a new concept: “heatwave trains”, a succession of extreme events with hardly any respite and which reflects a change in climate patterns in Europe and, especially, in Spain.

The La Mierla fire (Guadalajara), which is already the largest recorded in Castilla-La Mancha having burned some 29,000 hectares, has affected approximately a quarter of the Sierra Norte Natural Park. This protected area is one of the jewels of Castilian-Manchegan nature, an enclave of valuable forests and a habitat for wolves. Declared a natural park in 2011, this mountain range occupies 116,953 hectares in the northwest of the province of Guadalajara across 35 municipalities.

Javier Martín Vide, director of the Fabra Observatory in Barcelona (located very close to Tibidabo), emphasizes the importance of this weather station, which recorded on July 8 the absolute record for the highest temperature in the city of Barcelona: 40.9ºC. Its value lies – he tells us – in the uninterrupted 112-year series of weather measurements, which makes this station a true thermometer of climate change.

An international team of scientists has made a discovery that researchers had been pursuing for almost 20 years: the identification of a new species of primate in the depths of the rainforest of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, made possible by the sighting of two adult females and one male.