France evacuates 4,000 people as heat threatens wildfire fight across southwestern Europe
LEGE-CAP FERRET, France — French authorities ordered nearly 4,000 people evacuated Tuesday from tourist sites on France’s Atlantic coast as returning heat threatened firefighters’ fragile hold on a vast wildfire west of Bordeaux.
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The order underscored a wildfire emergency of exceptional scale across southwestern Europe.
Fires in France and Spain have forced roughly 330,000 people to evacuate. Spain braced for its fourth heat wave of the summer, with several blazes still out of control, including its largest on record.
Firefighters held the French blaze in check through a calm night, bringing flare-ups near coastal dunes under control and keeping the burned area unchanged at 420 square kilometers (162 square miles).
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Authorities described the Gironde fire as stabilized, not fixed, meaning it could still spread again as temperatures rose and humidity fell.
The precautionary evacuation order covered campsites, holiday villages, tourist residences and leisure parks around the resort of Lacanau, including Lacanau Ocean and both shores of Lacanau lake, Gironde regional authorities said.
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