macliam

The news gets worse, now 62 dead - 47 of them in or near cars attempting to reach the IC8. Truly awful.

Descansem em paz, compadres.

Jonny22

Truly awful and condolences to all. God, how brave are our bombeiros.
Top news on the BBC, first page in the Mirror, 5 pages down in the Mail, not a mention that I could find in the Telegraph, Guardian or HuffPost. During the London fire that was top news in all the Portuguese papers. Speaks volumes..

Ingles

Please be as kind as to check out Post Nº 10 on this thread

Jonny22

Apologies re Grauniad, missed that one. But I think I'm probably correct on the others and my point was broader. How can a bunch of Z listers and assorted mind numbing news (including the unmentionable B word) be more important and newsworthy at this sad time especially as the UK has also recently suffered a similar terrible tragedy. The UK press should be giving all the support they can to their Portuguese brothers and sisters at this time - fundraising and calling on the UK government to assist etc, not just pushing it to the bottom page where nobody will read it. Or, worse still ignoring it completely.

macliam

Foreign Aid? I'm not sure the kippers would approve of that.
I suspect many will be checking how far Coimbra is from Albufeira (and whether the breweries are affected).

But hey, votes down, no MPs, who gives a ****!

liveaboard

account of a brit expat who got caught in it;
Portugal fire survivor: 'I should have died' - BBC News

It could even be one of us...

scrubbedexpat142

Fairly typical I am afraid.

Jonny22

I know I shouldn't, but read the comments on the Mail story. You'll need to scroll down for 10 minutes though. I used to be proud to be British, not now though. What a @@@ing disgusting crowd inhabit that paper. Unfortunately this is what the rest of the world see and think it's reflective on all of us. Oh @@@k, what's happening. Hotel California?

Jonny22

Indeed it could and almost was a few years back. Thank god for the fantastic local support and the bombeiros. Our prayers are with the folk up there.

GeniB

Does anyone have personal contact with Mfesharne? This silence is getting scary. I'm thinking should the British Ambassador be informed? What do you do in circumstances like this?

Diddion

mfesharne: Visited Steve and Susan a couple of times - lovely people - and their house borders forest land; we're really worried. I have sent an email but no reply. With the awful statistics of Nodereinho fatalities (within, of course, the larger picture) we are on tenterhooks wondering if they are ok

If anyone has news of them, please let us all know via this thread.

Lion in Winter

Anyone seen sign of Red Eric? Don't know what part of the country he's in.

Red Eric

I'm fine thanks - a very long way north of the affected area. Very concerned about mfesharne, though - he'll be right in the thick of it. I guess the comms will all be knocked out completely round there.

macliam

Four children die in Portugal fires that have killed 62 | Daily Mail Online
There are some genuine comments and expressions of sympathy hidden amongst the dross, but I'm not really surprised at the comments - and they're not all from Brits or necessarily Mail readers. Given the cr@p and venom being spouted elsewhere this is just par for the course - trolling is the new sport. Many of those commenting probably don't know or care where Portugal is - and I notice at least one Spaniard having his own dig. It is disgusting though and makes me think of the old adage "If you've nothing good to say, say nothing".

macliam

I too am concerned that we've not heard from him and hope that it is just loss of comms.

My wife was close to the fires around Agueda last year and described it as hell on earth - and I had a bush fire on my land last year and saw how quickly it moved ....... believe me, if you've not experienced it, you don't know.

Although we get used to the fires each year, so much loss of life is truly terrible.