Brussels, 23/08/2006 (Agence Europe) - On 10 August France, Portugal and Italy agreed to help Spain put out its fires, which according to the most recent estimates have burned almost 92,000 ha of forest in Galicia in the north west of Spain. France has sent two Canadair jets and Italy two other identical planes, while Portugal, which has also suffered from a high number of forest fires sent twenty fire engines and 65 men. By activating the cooperation mechanism between EU countries, as laid down in the civil protection agreement, Spain requested three Canadair planes, five water firing helicopters and twenty fire engines. The European Commission's Monitoring and Information Centre relayed Madrid's request to the 30 member countries of the civil protection authorities network (25 Member States of the U, Bulgaria, Romania, Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein).
On 23 August the fires appeared to have been put out in Spain and Portugal but Greece appeared to be finding it difficult to put out its last remaining fires. According to estimates from Madrid released on 19 August, the fires in Spain burned around 6% of the estimated forest area in Galicia (1.5 million ha), a figure that is higher than the original estimate made by the regional authorities (77,000 ha) and that made by the European Commission (86,200 ha).
According to the European Forest Fire Information Service (EFFIS) set up by the European Commission, the map of fires that cover more than 50 ha, established by satellite imaging, reveals an increase in the surface areas burned and which for the period 31 July to 14 August increased from 13,591 ha to 49,881 ha in Portugal and from 2,241 ha to 88,473 ha in Galicia. On 31 July 2006, the temporary balance sheet of forest fires in the EU stood at more than 64,500 ha being burned, well below the 610,000 ha (twice the surface area of Luxembourg) destroyed in fires in 2005. the European Commission's Joint Research Centre that manages EFFIS noted that since May there has been “an unusual increase in the level of risk” in northern European countries. Fires were detected in the Netherlands, Austria, United Kingdom, Czech Republic, Lithuania and Sweden (as well as in Norway).