Spain has been fighting two large wildfires in the northeast and centre of the country, with one blaze stabilised and another still burning out of control.
The fire in Orés, in the Cinco Villas area of Zaragoza province, northeast Spain, was declared stabilised on the afternoon of July 19 by the regional government of Aragón. It had burnt about 14,400 hectares along a perimeter of some 78 kilometres since breaking out on July 15.
About 1,000 people were evacuated from Orés and nearby villages, among them Luesia, Uncastillo and Petilla de Aragón in the neighbouring region of Navarra. Aragón’s authorities said residents would be able to return once homes and infrastructure had been checked.
The Orés blaze became Spain’s largest of the year, days after a fire in Los Gallardos, in Almería province, southeast Spain, killed 13 people earlier in July.
Further south, the fire in La Mierla, in the Sierra Norte of Guadalajara province, central Spain, remained out of control on July 19. It had advanced roughly 14 kilometres overnight and burnt about 13,000 hectares since starting on July 16.
Emergency services in the Castilla-La Mancha region evacuated 21 localities near the La Mierla fire, affecting some 800 people. Crews concentrated on defending several villages and attacking the fire’s southern flank.
The two fires marked the most serious point of a season running well ahead of last year. The European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS), part of the European Union’s Copernicus programme, recorded more than 62,000 hectares burnt in Spain in 2026.
That was around two and a half times the 25,221 hectares logged by the same date in 2025, an increase of about 146 per cent. Spain’s environment ministry had earlier counted 15 large fires by July 5, against six a year before.
The blazes came during a heatwave that pushed temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius across much of the country. The state weather agency AEMET had warned of extreme fire risk, with strong winds and low humidity hampering efforts to contain the flames.
Last year Spain suffered its worst wildfire season in decades, though the bulk of that damage came from August. The current total already stands far above the equivalent stage of 2025.
