Displaced from wildfires in Spain share their stories of uncertainty and narrow escapes
VILLAVICIOSA DE ODÓN, Spain (AP) — Elvira Menéndez knows how lucky she is that her home isn’t a charred ruin like so many others. Spain and France shaken by deadly forest fires.
But the 79-year-old retiree can’t help but worry about another family escaping the raging inferno like his.
“They’re left with nothing,” he said of a young family living on his son’s street. “The house was completely burned down and they have three children.”
out of control forest fires Tens of thousands of hectares of land have been destroyed in three central Spanish provinces in recent days and nearly 90,000 people have been forced to flee their homes. More than 250,000 people fled their homes due to fire in the wine region of Bordeaux in southwestern France.
Survivors face an uncertain future
For the hundreds of thousands of people in this situation, the question remains the same: What will they find when they are finally allowed to go home or to what’s left of them?
With no information on when he might return to his hometown of Chapinería, west of the Spanish capital Madrid, Menéndez will spend his third night on Sunday in a makeshift shelter set up at a sports complex in Villaviciosa de Odón, a 40-minute drive from the home he had to leave as the fire approached.
Menéndez, who was at the shelter with his family and dog, said, “At least we are all together.”
On Friday afternoon, two large fires near Madrid merged into a single, rapidly spreading fire. It later merged with another fire burning in Ávila, north of the capital. This forced the government to declare a national fire emergency for the first time. The flames have since spread to the southwestern state of Toledo. The flames destroyed a total of 77,000 hectares in the central part of the country alone.
Menéndez’s pain was also shared by Rocío Domínguez, who escaped from her home with only the clothes on her back. “All the clothes, all the memories, everything, everything, everything” was left behind, he told The Associated Press.
“The only thing I had time to buy was a kit I had for dogs,” added Domínguez, surrounded by her two beloved pets. He took everything he had with him from the shelter, from the clothes he wore to the food and toiletries.
It was an ‘apocalyptic’ scene for many
In the evacuation center, where beds have been set up for about 200 people, the terrible memory of Domínguez’s escape is still fresh in his mind.
“It was crazy, with cars going up and down, traffic jams on the village streets with people trying to get out. It looked like the apocalypse,” said Domínguez, a 35-year-old unemployed man who was with his parents and siblings. “You couldn’t see anything.”
“Everything was covered in ash,” he added. “You could see all the burned animals.”
Spanish King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia heard more of these personal testimonies on Sunday as the royal family visited another retreat in Villamartín, about 45 kilometers west of Madrid.
And these stories may not be the last; Sara Aagesen, Spain’s Minister of Ecological Transition, later stated that “more evacuations are still expected” in this region.
After meeting the survivors, Queen Letizia told reporters: “It is important to hear how they felt and how they described their hasty departure from their homes. How they felt the sadness, the pain, the uncertainty and the questions they left hanging in the air.”
Wildfire sparks tragedy after World Cup in Spain
The fires have dramatically changed the mood in the country, where just a week ago huge crowds took to the streets to celebrate the second FIFA World Cup victory.
As the echoes of those celebrations faded, head coach Luis de la Fuente, one of the driving forces behind the historic victory over Argentina in the final in New Jersey, visited those affected by the fire at a sports center in Las Rozas.
The Spanish Football Federation, headquartered in the same city, offered vulnerable families who had to be evacuated from their homes the facilities where the newly crowned world champions usually train.
Koç said that all of Spain gathered for the survivors of the forest fire.
“The whole of Spain is watching them,” De la Fuente told national public broadcaster TVE. “They have the support of the whole country, the same support we have when we play football. It’s exactly the same.”
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Medrano reported from Madrid.
