Portugal tackles last of deadly northern forest fires

Portugal’s firefighters have mastered most of the deadly forest fires in the north of the country, according to official data Thursday.

And improving weather conditions have raised hopes that they could extinguish the last of the blazes by the end of the day.

The wildfires, which sprang up over the weekend fed by crushing heat and strong winds, have killed five people, four of them firefighters. Another 77 people were injured, 12 of them seriously.

By late morning on Thursday the civil protection service website said 1,200 firefighters were battling the six remaining fires in the northern districts of Aveiro and Viseu.

A day earlier, 3,900 firefighters were tackling 42 active fires, supported by more than a thousand vehicles and around 30 aircraft.

But overnight, the teams brought several blazes in villages in the Aveiro region covering a front of around 100 kilometres (60 miles) under control.

Temperatures have dropped since the weekend and rain is forecast for Friday.

But there has been extensive damage in the north and centre of the country, much of it to the eucalyptus groves there.

One estimate issued Wednesday by the Copernicus observatory said at least 15,000 hectares (37,000 acres) of vegetation had been destroyed.

And data from the European Forest Fires Information System (Effis) said the total area hit by the recent fires came to 100,000 hectares: 10 times more than the area burnt since the beginning of summer.

Dozens of houses were also destroyed or damaged.