Wildfires rage across Europe as heatwaves drive record temperatures

A wildfire in Croatia claimed one life, injured 40, and forced 1,200 to flee their homes overnight in the picturesque town of Omis on the Dalmatian coast. The blaze, fueled by record-breaking heat and drought conditions linked to climate change, also swept across Greece, France, and England.

In northern Greece, more than 300 people were evacuated by boat from the town of Siviri, where a forest fire turned the sky dark grey. Over 140 firefighters, nine aircraft, and seven helicopters battled the flames, while fishing vessels assisted in the evacuation.

Officials in England reported that wildfires hit a record level for a second year in a row, exacerbated by five consecutive heatwaves. Phil Garrigan, chair of the National Fire Chiefs Council, warned that the situation could worsen, with a considerable increase in wildfires compared to previous years.

In France, 525 people were evacuated from the village of Luglon after a wildfire broke out in the Landes region. In Spain, a wildfire in Huelva burned 31,000 hectares and forced the evacuation of 700 people. Firefighting planes in Spain have logged over 8,200 hours of flying time this year, surpassing the total hours flown in 2025, when a record 393,000 hectares burned.

The European Union's Copernicus Climate Change Service issued a warning of "very extreme" conditions across large areas of central and eastern Europe, with additional pockets over southern Britain, Ireland, northern France, and southern Sweden. The average high temperature across Western Europe was forecast to be 31.2 degrees Celsius (88 degrees Fahrenheit), 8 degrees Celsius (14 degrees Fahrenheit) above the typical value from 1961 to 1990.

The relentless heat and drought could also significantly impact agriculture, potentially halving France's maize harvest and reducing European Union production to its smallest in decades.