In Spain, a fire near Tarragona ravages more than 2,300 hectares of forest and forces several villages into lockdown.

A fire has burned more than 2,300 hectares of forest near Tarragona in Catalonia, northeast Spain, forcing several surrounding villages into lockdown, authorities announced on Tuesday, July 8. The forest fire "affects an area of ​​approximately 2,377 hectares of land, much of it forest," Catalan rural agents wrote on X, specifying that 30% of this area was located in the Ports Natural Park, which extends over more than 34,000 hectares.

"The night, marked by strong winds with gusts of up to 90 km/h, complicated the extinguishing work and forced the containment zone to be widened," the firefighters explained on the same social network. "If you are in the area of ​​the Paüls fire (...) the safest thing is to stay indoors, close doors and windows, and not go out into the street. Follow the instructions of the authorities and call @112 if necessary," added the civil protection on the same platform.

Several villages are affected by this request from the authorities not to leave their homes, and several roads have been closed. According to a message posted on X by the Civil Protection Service late this morning, more than 18,000 people living in the municipalities bordering the natural park of Paüls, Alfara de Carles, Xerta, Fusée, Tortosa, Aldover, and Tivenys, are affected by the containment measures. The army, which includes the Military Emergency Unit (UME), deployed overnight to the area to assist with rescue operations, it reported on X. Around 300 firefighters are already deployed on the ground, according to Spanish media.

Footage captured by firefighters aboard a helicopter on Monday evening showed arid hills covered in smoke, encased in a dark grey and orange cloud across a wide area of ​​the landscape.

For several days, Spain has been facing scorching temperatures, which have dried out the soil and increased the risk of fires breaking out.

According to the Spanish Meteorological Agency (Aemet), Spain experienced its hottest June on record, with an average temperature of 23.6°C. The agency points out that the frequency of heat waves has tripled over the past ten years in Spain.

In 2022, 300,000 hectares were destroyed by more than 500 fires in the country, a record in Europe, according to the European Forest Fire Information System (Effis). While this figure had dropped to around 42,000 hectares in 2024, by early summer 2025, 21,000 hectares had already gone up in smoke, according to Effis.

A few days ago, the Spanish Minister for Ecological Transition, Sara Aagesen, declared that she expected a "very complicated" summer in terms of forest fires.