Rainfall aids fight against Belgium's biggest wildfire, as blazes rip through Europe

Rainfall in eastern Belgium on Monday morning provided assistance to firefighters battling the country's largest wildfire on record, which had been close to reaching the German border. Europe experienced numerous wildfires this summer due to severe heatwaves, intensified by climate change-induced drought, leading to tinder-dry vegetation. Combined, these factors have resulted in 576,000 hectares of land burned across Europe this year, a region twice the size of Luxembourg.

Over the weekend, an elderly couple perished in fires ravaging the Greek island of Salamina, with 500 people evacuated on ferries as gale-force winds pushed flames toward residential areas, causing property damage. Another blaze in Aragon, northeastern Spain, destroyed 16,600 hectares, while a fire in the tourist town of Omis, Croatia, compelled 1,000 residents to evacuate.

In Belgium, the weather agency IRM predicted between 5 to 9mm of rain in the High Fens, a nature reserve in the east that had been burning since Friday.

Temperatures were set to drop to around 20°C, after surpassing 30°C last week during a heatwave that saw parts of Belgium hit temperatures up to 37°C. This shift in weather conditions, along with the rain, would significantly aid firefighting efforts; however, large portions of western, southern, and central Europe remained at high risk for wildfires on Monday, according to EFFIS data.

Despite the cooler temperatures, western, southern, and central Europe continued to face a high risk of wildfires on Monday, as per EFFIS data. Extreme fire risk has become a regular occurrence in Europe's summers due to hotter, drier weather caused by climate change, exacerbated by rural abandonment, which leaves land untended, allowing flammable, dry vegetation to accumulate in forests, fueling fast-spreading fires. Roughly 90% of wildfires are ignited by human activity, such as campfires or discarded cigarettes.