The return of the heat raises fears of a further worsening of the fires on Tuesday in Gironde, in the south-west of France, where any return of evacuees remains unthinkable in the face of fires which have already ravaged 42,000 hectares.
Forests catch fire all the more easily as European vegetation and soils have been very dry for months, a phenomenon accentuated by climate change and recent exceptional heatwaves.
The Météo-France forecaster anticipates a “new heat wave” in the departments of Gironde and Landes, with temperatures which could reach up to 40°C on Wednesday and slightly less strong but drier winds. And in Spain, the authorities are also worried about the arrival of heat and a southerly wind which could reignite the fires raging near Madrid.
“The coming weeks will be hard and we must hold on,” warned the President of the Republic Emmanuel Macron on Monday. We remain united and we fight to win the battle everywhere,” he said, delivering good news in the evening: the fire is now “fixed” in the Landes.
Monday evening, 15,000 people received authorization to return home or return to their campsite, according to the prefect.
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Sports and cultural events prohibited
In a campsite in Grand Crohot, in Gironde, children’s toys on the ground, beers on the table, open tents and beach towels still spread out… everything testifies to the speed and panic with which vacationers had to leave the area. A large part of the tents and caravans were saved from the blaze, but others, on the hellish path of the fire, completely disappeared.
As the fire has not been fixed, no return of evacuees is possible at this stage in this tourist department, and the activities of the summer camps are suspended.
The prefect also announced Monday evening the ban on sporting and cultural events.
In the large city of Bordeaux, “a little more than 1,000 people” were still accommodated at the city’s exhibition center, including “less than a hundred” people who were residents of nursing homes, according to the mayor and president of the metropolis, Thomas Cazenave.
Like Monday, no high-speed trains will run south of Bordeaux on Tuesday, except those serving Agen and Toulouse, and the A63 motorway is closed in both directions between Bordeaux and Bayonne.
In total, more than 116,000 hectares – a new record after 2022 – have been covered by fires in France since the start of 2026, indicated Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu.
The fire which engulfed the area around the very touristy Arcachon Basin led to the evacuation of 220,000 people, an operation on an unprecedented scale.
Seventh day of struggle
In the Var, the outbreaks of the Gros Bessillon fire, which mobilized firefighters on Monday, on the seventh day of fighting this fire, were “contained” Monday evening, the prefecture announced in a press release.
The fire on the island of Corsica (southeast) is still ongoing, while that in the Haute-Alpes (east) was “fixed” after covering 510 hectares.
In Bouches-du-Rhône (south-east), a 38-year-old volunteer firefighter died on Monday, after the tanker truck in which he was traveling alone “left the road” north of Arles, said the departmental Fire and Rescue service.
In neighboring Spain, firefighters are redoubling their efforts to control the terrible fires raging near Madrid before the weather changes.
The wind “will then blow from the South and anything that cannot be contained could well complicate the situation again. This is what makes the effort that will be deployed “until noon” so important, underlined the government delegate in the Madrid region, Fran Martin Aguirre.
Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, for his part, predicted “complex times” with “increasing temperatures”.
