Cause of forest fire: More than 50 people arrested for arson in Portugal

Cause of forest fire
More than 50 people have been arrested for arson in Portugal

Only a small fraction of the fires in Portugal have natural causes. Most fires are caused by carelessness. After all, some of them can be traced back to targeted homicides, which is why more than 50 people have already been arrested this year.

According to the government, carelessness and deliberate arson may be to blame for the devastating forest fires that have raged in holiday destination Portugal over the past few days and weeks. More than 50 people had been arrested by mid-July this year, Interior Minister Jose Luis Carneiro told a parliamentary inquiry. This is more than 20 arrests more than the same period last year, he stressed.

According to the authorities’ findings, only 23 percent of fires in Portugal are purely natural causes. 60 percent are caused by careless use of fire, such as grilling and smoking or lighting campfires. According to Carneiro, 13 percent set fires intentionally. The minister explained that the remaining 4 percent would be due to the use of agricultural machinery. Portugal is doing everything to make society aware of the dangers and take preventive measures.

Fires in Portugal have already destroyed nearly 60,000 hectares in six and a half months this year, according to ICNF, the Nature Conservation Commission. This is double the previous year’s total (28,415 hectares). This year, the outbreak and spread of wildfires has been favored by months of drought, particularly severe heat waves and, more recently, strong winds, according to Civil Defense. In different parts of Portugal, six large forest fires were active in the evening and were fought by a total of more than 900 emergency services, state television broadcaster RTP reported.

Thousands of firefighters continued to battle the blaze. In Portugal, an elderly couple died trying to escape a creeping fire near their home. A couple in their 70s drove down the road in their car, Mario Artur Lopes, mayor of Murcia, a small town in northern Portugal, said on television Monday evening. The car and its occupants were completely gutted. While the scorching heat has eased slightly in Portugal, temperatures are likely to rise again on Wednesday

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