Mitzyboy

From a small amount of smoke in the hills above Gandia its suddenly shot up the hill in the trees, and I can see huge flames ... all in the matter of five minutes

Helicopter flying over it now

Such a shame

Rosemary

Everything seems to burn so quickly, they do not have chance to stop it.

Rosemary

davidinspain

Was only a matter of time it's been very dry

steviedeluxe

I've heard it reported that the worst years for fires are when Spain has a wet Spring as that encourages rapid plant growth. When the inevitable hot dry summer appears then all that plant stuff dries out and becomes tinder for fires.

agoreira

I think the fires might be the least of their problems, the lack of rain is already costing loses of millions of euros in agriculture. They are talking about the driest year in 70 years. There's a lot worse to come.
http://www.abc.es/20120307/ciencia/a...-20120307.html

Dick Dasterdly

Never seen the countryside around me here in the Valencian region looking so sad at this time of the year.

Many citrus plantations have obviously taken a big hit from those sharper than usual frosts of a month or so ago.

Whilst much of the campo in general which is normally very green in this neck of the woods, now looks completely browned off, as though having recently suffered from a mid-summer heatwave.

agoreira

We quite like Costa de la Luz area, but we nearly always go in April-Maytime and catch all the spring flowers. My brother worked for years in Dubai, and went there because we liked it so much. Problem was he went in August, he didn't like it at all, said it was all brown and parched, like being back in Dubai.

Rosemary

The mountains behind our house are lovely and has their usual good coating of greenery, no sign at all of the lack of rain this spring so far but if this continues I suspect that the summer will see the greenery dying back.

The orange groves look great too. Many of the orange grove owners have told me that how cold it was a few weeks ago was a disaster for the oranges but that their trees seem to be alright at the moment. Saying that the oranges that we have been given from about six different owners have been as sweet and juicy as they have other years. I presume that they are talking about having to have sufficient numbers of a set size for the supermarkets that they export to.

Rosemary

agoreira

They're lucky, as the report say, the majority have lost their orange harvest completely, and as well as losing their crops, they have the added cost of removing and destroying the ruined fruit. Your boys should get a good price if they are that good!

Rosemary

Although their oranges are delicious they would not be able to sell them because the skins are marked or they are distorted.

Rosemary

Rosemary

Mitzy, did it take them long to put the fire out and did it spread over quite an area?

Rosemary

Mitzyboy

Remarkably they semed to get it down (not sure if out) quite quickly ... alhough I think it may have gone around the mountain. There was still a helicopter over there this morning

steviedeluxe

I think a huge chunk of western Europe is suffering from lack of rain. Despite having had two days rain in the last 8 days, they're talking about drought conditions here in London. Of course the danger here is not forest fires but how to supply water to 10+ million people

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-17102615

steviedeluxe

Hose pipe bans to be introduced in many parts of southern England - and it's only March!

mikelincs

Yes, South-East England will have hosepipe ban from April 1st, winter rainfall has been only 75% of normal and the resovoirs were already low after last year.