The fire that has been ravaging northern and central Portugal since Sunday has several allies: high temperatures, low humidity, anarchic winds and arsonists. Prime Minister Luís Montenegro called attention to the coincidence of the simultaneous appearance of so many outbreaks in nearby towns, as was recorded during the day on Monday.
Since Saturday, four people have been arrested by the Judicial Police and the National Republican Guard for their alleged involvement in several fires. A 47-year-old woman was arrested on suspicion of having started six fires in recent days in the towns of Sebal and Condeixa-a-Nova. “She set fire in areas with a large forest, populated by scrub and pine, close to the urban area, endangering the physical integrity and life of people, homes and forest cover on hundreds of hectares,” reported the Judicial Police. Another 33-year-old woman is also arrested as the alleged perpetrator of five fires in Alvaiázere. The two arrested men, aged 38 and 75, are suspected of causing two fires in Pombal.
However, the Portuguese authorities do not have the data at the moment to know how many of the 148 fires recorded in the last few hours are intentional. Of these, by 10.30 (Spanish time), 64 fires had been extinguished or were in the process of being extinguished. Of the other 84, 51 were active, where the bulk of the extinguishing equipment was concentrated, and another 30 had been recently declared. In total, 5,163 personnel had been mobilised by that time, 1,600 land resources and 21 air resources, according to data from the National Emergency and Civil Protection Authority. The most serious were located in the towns of Albergaria-a-Velha and Sever de Vouga, in the district of Aveiro; Oliveira de Azeméis, in the district of Porto, and Coimbra.



Jose Coelho (EFE)




Carlos Garcia (EFE)

Carlos Garcia (EFE)

Carlos Garcia (EFE)


Estela Silva (EFE)


Estela Silva (EFE)




PAULO NOVAIS (EFE)


PAULO NOVAIS (EFE)



Four fatalities
In the last few hours, a fourth victim has been recorded: a woman who died in her home in Almeidinha, in Mangualde, due to “sudden death”, according to the Lusa agency. In total, four people have died since last Sunday, one of them directly by being burned to death while fighting the fire and the other three, indirectly, by cardiac episodes. One of the deceased was the firefighter João Silva while participating in the fight against a forest fire in Oliveira de Azeméis.
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Another 40 people have been injured and dozens have had to be evacuated from their homes. Sections of six motorways have been closed to traffic and rail traffic has been suspended at three points on the Douro and Vouga lines.

The government has extended the state of alert in the country until next Thursday. The weather forecast is bad for the next few hours due to high temperatures and winds, especially in a hundred localities. The risk of fire is extreme in more than half of the country (the centre and the north) and will only begin to ease from Wednesday, according to the Portuguese Institute of the Sea and the Atmosphere. “We are going to go through difficult hours in the next few days,” warned the Prime Minister, Luís Montenegro, in a statement late on Monday.
Montenegro and the President of the Republic, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, visited the headquarters of the National Emergency and Civil Protection Authority, where they thanked both the work of the firefighting teams and European solidarity. Spain, France, Italy and Greece have provided a total of eight aircraft to participate in the extinguishing process, after the activation of the European Union Civil Protection Mechanism on Monday. The Prime Minister urged the population to respect the instructions of the emergency services and expressed his solidarity with the families of the victims and those affected by the flames.