France battles massive wildfires as Macron chairs emergency meeting; 300,000 evacuated

French President Emmanuel Macron is set to chair a crisis cabinet meeting to manage wildfires currently raging across southern France, according to CNBC.

The wildfires, which began in Gironde in the Southwest of France on Wednesday, have to date burned 42,000 hectares and have forced more than 300,000 people to evacuate, one of the biggest evacuations in French history.

France's interior minister, Laurent Nunez, said (translated from French to English), “The situation remains highly unfavourable” on X on Saturday. He further added more information regarding the start of the fire, saying again on X, “At the start of the night, in Gironde, the fire became extremely virulent and unpredictable again, generating its own wind and spreading erratically toward the Bordeaux metropolitan area. By the end of the night, it had calmed down somewhat.”

Wildfires a “historic situation” for France

French Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu described the wildfires as a “historic situation” for the country, with nearly 100,000 hectares burnt since the start of the year, which is an unprecedented level, according to him. French Finance Minister Roland Lescure described its economic effects as “a clap of thunder for an area which could have done without this.”

The gigantic fire is being described as a “pyrocumulonimbus”, a type of fire cloud which generates its own winds, making it very erratic and hard to manage, according to a statement made by Nicolas Braz, a firefighter Captain to AFP. 2500 firefighters, 1500 military personnel and nearly 1200 police have been deployed to manage the fire and bring it under control.

Stefan Doerr, a professor of wildland fire science at Swansea University, told CNBC Europe that climate change and poor land management are contributing to the increasing intensity of wildfires.

He said that the abandonment of agricultural land in parts of Southern Europe, especially in the Mediterranean and parts of Madrid, has allowed flammable grasses, shrubs and dense forests to spread. All of these factors will make fires hard to contain during conditions of extreme heat and drought. Speaking on this subject, he stated, “That simply means if we have extreme weather conditions, these extreme droughts, if there is an ignition, it just becomes much more difficult to fight.”

The fire, beginning in Southern France, has begun to spread into parts of Spain, with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez expected to visit fire-hit areas in the Easter-Spanish city of Valencia.