About 50 residents had to be evacuated as the fires ripped through the countryside. Madrid Security and Emergency Agency described the blazes as of “maximum concern”
The blaze broke out on Thursday(Image: AP)
An out-of-control wildfire broke out near Madrid on Thursday, sending a massive plume of smoke over the Spanish capital and forcing people out of their homes.
About 50 residents had to be evacuated as the fires ripped through the countryside. Madrid Security and Emergency Agency described the blazes as of “maximum concern” as extreme levels of forest fires are reported throughout the region, and 40mph winds threaten to push them further and faster.
The blaze began in the town of Méntrida, located in the Castile-La Mancha region about 50 kilometers (30 miles) southwest of Madrid. Local authorities advised residents to remain indoors and keep their windows closed due to poor air quality.
By late evening, officials reported that the fire had scorched around 3,000 hectares (approximately 7,400 acres). Firefighters on the ground and in the air were working to contain the flames, which ignited around 3 p.m.
Residents had to be evacuated (Image: AFP via Getty Images)
Strong winds carried the smoke over Madrid, turning the skies orange and filling the air with haze throughout the afternoon. Much of Spain remains under heat and wildfire alerts, with temperatures in Madrid reaching 37°C (100°F) on Thursday.
Europe is warming faster than any other continent, with average temperatures rising at twice the global rate since the 1980s, according to the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.
Experts warn that climate change is intensifying the frequency and severity of heatwaves and droughts, increasing the risk of wildfires across the region.
This summer so far has been a particularly bad one for wildfires across Europe, with many countries in the south of the Continent becoming tinder-box dry after months of intense heat.
“Extreme heat is no longer a rare event — it has become the new normal,” declared U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres via Twitter from Seville, Spain, earlier this summer. Echoing his oft-repeated plea for dramatic measures to curb climate change, Guterres proclaimed: “The planet is getting hotter & more dangerous — no country is immune.”
The extreme heat poses a significant threat to life. In 2023, a record-breaking heatwave in Europe claimed 61,000 lives. According to William Spencer, climate and first aid product manager at the British Red Cross, “Heatwaves are becoming more frequent and getting worse because of climate change.
“Sadly, we have seen cases already this year of the tragic impact high temperatures can have on human life. High temperatures make it harder for the body to cool itself and we all need to take care to manage the health risks of heat. If you are travelling to a country experiencing extreme heat, there are several steps you can take to keep yourself and others safe.”
As mercury levels soar, the newly launched early warning system, Forecaster.health, is set to be a game-changer. This pioneering pan-European platform offers real-time predictions on the mortality risks associated with temperature changes, tailored for various demographics.
Holidaymakers worried about the scorching weather can now assess their personal health risks before jetting off. Before you pack your bags for that much-needed getaway, be sure to check the weather forecast to stay ahead of any potential heat hazards.
This week, reality TV show star Spencer Pratt posted multiple videos on social media savaging a proposed state bill on wildfire rebuilding. In one, Pratt told his 2 million TikTok followers that he consulted an artificial intelligence engine about Senate Bill 549. He said it told him the legislation would allow L.A. County to buy burned-out lots in Pacific Palisades and convert them to low-income housing, strip away local zoning decisions and push dense reconstruction. He urged people to oppose it.
“I don’t even think this is political,” Pratt said. “This is a common sense post.”
None of what Pratt said is in the bill. But over the last week, such misinformation-fueled furor has overwhelmed the conversation in Los Angeles, at the state Capitol and on social media about wildfire recovery. Posts have preyed on fears of neighborhood change, mistrust of government authorities and prejudice against low-income housing to assert, among other things, that the wildfires were set intentionally to raze the Palisades and replace the community with affordable housing.
The chatter has unmoored debate over a major rebuilding proposal from L.A. County leaders. Under the plan, a new local authority would be able to buy burned lots, rebuild homes and offer them back at discounted rates to the original owners. The idea is to give property owners struggling to rebuild another option to stay in their communities. There are no changes to any rules that require zoning amendments or approvals for individual housing developments.
State Sen. Benjamin Allen (D-Santa Monica), the author of SB 549, which creates the local authority, said he understands legitimate policy disagreements over the new powers granted in the bill.
But those discussions have been overshadowed, he said.
“It’s become this total meme among the right-wing blogosphere and, unfortunately, picked up by some lazy-ass journalists that don’t bother to read the bill that say this bill seeks to turn the entire Palisades into low-income housing,” Allen said.
Some of his own friends who lost homes in the Palisades, Allen said, have been texting him asking why he’s trying to force low-income housing into the neighborhood.
“People are saying I want to put a train line in there,” Allen said. “It’s insane.”
The frenzy, in part, is due to an issue of timing. Last month, a 20-member expert commission impaneled by L.A. County proposed the local authority as a key recommendation for rebuilding after January’s Palisades and Eaton fires destroyed 18,000 homes and other properties.
Commission leaders then approached Allen about writing a bill that would allow for its implementation. Allen wanted to do it, but deadlines for introducing new legislation had long passed.
Instead, Allen took SB 549, which had nothing to do with wildfire rebuilding but was still alive in the Legislature, and added the rebuilding authority language to it. This is a common legislative procedure used when putting forward ideas late in the year.
Allen decided as well to keep the original language in the bill, which called for significant spending on low-income housing in an unrelated financing program. Multiple news articles conflated the two portions of the bill, which added to the alarm.
The version of SB 549 with the wildfire rebuilding authority in it had its first hearing in a legislative committee on Wednesday. Allen spent much of the hearing acknowledging the confusion around it.
State housing officials carved out $101 million from long-planned funding allocations for low-income housing and dedicated it to building new developments in Los Angeles.
The money will be used to subsidize low-income apartment buildings throughout the county with priority given to projects proposed in and around burn zones, that are willing to reserve a portion to fire survivors and are close to breaking ground.
“Thousands of families — from Pacific Palisades to Altadena to Malibu — are still displaced and we owe it to them to help,” Newsom said when unveiling the spending.
Like the proposed rebuilding authority, the funding does not change any zoning or other land-use rules. Any developer who receives the dollars would need separate governmental approval to begin construction.
Nevertheless, social media posters took the new money and the proposed new authority and saw a conspiracy.
Newsom called the situation another example of “opportunists exploit[ing] this tragedy to stoke fear — and pit communities against each other.”
“Let’s be clear: The state is not taking away anyone’s property, instituting some sort of mass rezoning or destroying the quality and character of destroyed neighborhoods. Period,” Newsom said in a statement to The Times. “Anyone claiming otherwise is either misinformed or deliberately lying. That’s not just wrong — it’s disgraceful.”
Not all of the debate about the rebuilding authority is based on false information.
Allen and local leaders acknowledged the need for more consensus over its role, especially given the sensitivities around recovery. Still unresolved were the authority’s governing structure, and whether it would encompass the Palisades or be limited to Altadena and other unincorporated areas.
Pratt lost his Palisades home in the fire and has sued the city, alleging it failed to maintain an adequate water supply and other infrastructure. In social media videos this week, Pratt said he and other residents didn’t trust the county with increased power over rebuilding when he believed leaders failed to protect the neighborhood in the first place.
“We’re a fire-stricken community, not a policy sandbox,” Pratt said. “We do not support the county becoming a dominant landowner in the Palisades.”
Representatives for Pratt could not be reached for comment.
By the end of Wednesday, Allen conceded defeat on SB 549. There were many legitimate hurdles to the bill passing before the Legislature adjourns in mid-September, he said. Notably, a representative for Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass told the legislative committee that she was opposed to the bill because the city had yet to be convinced of its efficacy.
But the misinformation surrounding the bill made it even harder to envision its success, he said. Allen decided to hold the bill and have it reconsidered when the Legislature convenes again in January.
“If we’re going to do this, I want the time to do it right,” he said.
Visitors on the Skywalk with the Grand Canyon below at the opening of the Grand Canyon Skywalk at Grand Canyon West, Arizona, in 2007. Wildfires have scorched at least 45,000 near the Canyon, prompting hundreds of evacuations near the North Rim Sunday. File photo UPI Photo/Art Foxall | License Photo
July 13 (UPI) — Two wildfires burning near the Grand Canyon have scorched more than 45,000 acres of tinder dry brush and vegetation and prompted evacuation orders for the Kaibab National Forest and north to the Utah border.
The Bureau of Land Management is coordinating with Coconino County fire officials on the evacuations of hundreds of people. Both fires continue to burn out of control and are 0% contained, officials said. Nearly 600 crews have been assigned to battle the fires.
At least 500 visitors were also evacuated from public park areas in the North Rim where the fires are burning.
The White Sage Fire has burned more than 40,000 acres near the canyon’s North Rim while the Dragon Bravo Fire has burned more than 5,000 acres, state and federal fire officials reported Sunday.
Lighting from rogue thunderstorms sparked the White Sage Fire, which spread quickly among pinyon pine and juniper trees, fanned by gusty winds and low humidity.
“On the ground resources are now focusing on a full suppression strategy to protect structures in the North Rim developed area,” Grand Canyon Park officials said on InciWeb.
Steep and rugged terrain creates a challenge for firefighters trying to reach the blazes and dry weather continues to pose challenges and a threat for the fires to spread further.
Park officials have said the closures are expected to last until Aug. 9 or until the fires are contained.
The fires were contained with help from Turkish, Jordanian, Lebanese, Qatari and Iraqi firefighting teams.
Wildfires in northwestern Syria, which have burned vast tracts of forest and farmland and forced evacuations, have been brought under control after 10 days.
In a statement posted on Facebook on Sunday, the civil defence agency said, “with the spread of the fires halted and the fire hotspots brought under control on all fronts”, teams on the ground are working to cool down the affected areas while monitoring any signs of reignition.
The blazes in the coastal province of Latakia broke out on July 3 amid an intense heatwave across the region, which also affected the Dortyol district and neighbouring Turkiye.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said it destroyed about 100 square kilometres (40 square miles) of forest and farmland.
As the fires raged, Syrian emergency workers not only had to use outdated equipment but also contend with high temperatures, strong winds, rugged mountainous terrain and the danger of explosive war remnants.
This all comes in a country worn down by years of conflict and economic crisis, nearly seven months after the ousting of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad and the installation of a transitional government led by Ahmed al-Sharaa, the leader of the now-disbanded armed group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.
In a post on X, Raed al-Saleh, Syria’s minister for emergencies and disaster management, said civil defence and firefighting teams “managed to halt the spread of the fire on all fronts” with help from Turkish, Jordanian, Lebanese, Qatari and Iraqi teams.
Turkiye earlier sent two firefighting aircraft to help battle the blazes. Eleven fire trucks and water support vehicles were also dispatched, according to al-Saleh.
“Firefighting teams are intensively working to extinguish remaining hotspots and cool the areas already put out. The situation is moving toward containment followed by comprehensive cooling operations,” said al-Saleh.
“There are still threats due to wind activity, but we are working to prevent any renewed fire expansion.”
Authorities have not reported any casualties, but several towns in Latakia province were evacuated as a precaution.
With human-induced climate change increasing the likelihood and intensity of droughts and wildfires worldwide, Syria has also been battered by heatwaves and low rainfall.
In June, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization said Syria has “not seen such bad climate conditions in 60 years”.
Wildfires near Marseille, France have forced the airport to close and injured nine firefighters as more than 700 hectares burned. Officials urged residents to stay indoors as heatwaves and strong winds fuel fire risks across southern France.
Blazes break out in France, Greece, Turkiye and Syria, with several other nations on high alert amid warnings of scorching weather.
Countries across the Mediterranean are battling fast-spreading wildfires and soaring temperatures as a heatwave sweeps through Southern Europe and parts of the Middle East, prompting evacuations and emergency alerts.
Blazes broke out in Greece, Turkiye, France and Syria on Sunday, with several other nations on high alert as forecasters warned that the scorching weather would intensify in the coming days.
From Spain to Italy, authorities urged residents to protect vulnerable people and avoid unnecessary travel during the region’s first severe heatwave of the summer.
Emergency teams and ambulances were stationed near popular tourist destinations, while meteorologists warned that extreme heat events – supercharged by climate change – are becoming more frequent and intense.
A firefighter walks past a burned house in Pikermi, east of Athens, Greece, July 3, 2025 [George Vitsaras/EPA]
In western Turkiye, wildfires erupted on Sunday in Izmir province, fanned by strong winds. Firefighters, supported by aircraft, fought to control the blaze. Local authorities said five neighbourhoods in the Seferihisar district were evacuated as a precaution.
Authorities said firefighters have battled more than 600 fires in the drought-hit nation over the past week.
Turkish authorities arrested 10 suspects in relation to wildfires that broke out across the country over the past week, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said on Friday.
Firefighters were still trying to control a blaze in the southern coastal area of Dortyol in Hatay province.
Meanwhile, in Greece, more than 160 firefighters, 46 fire trucks and five aircraft were deployed to combat flames in southern Evia.
The blaze, which began late on Friday, burned through forested areas and forced two villages to evacuate, officials said. Fires also broke out near Athens.
France also saw wildfires break out in the Corbieres region of Aude in the southwest, where temperatures soared above 40C (104F). A campsite and a historic abbey were evacuated.
Meteo France placed 84 of the country’s 101 departments under orange-level heat alerts on Monday.
A firefighting aircraft flies over a fire engine during efforts to contain a wildfire near Pikermi suburb, east of Athens, Greece, July 3, 2025 [George Vitsaras/EPA]
In Spain, the national weather agency AEMET reported temperatures reaching 44C (111F) in parts of Extremadura and Andalusia.
“I feel that the heat we’re experiencing is not normal for this time of year,” said Diego Radames, a 32-year-old photographer in Madrid, speaking to the AFP news agency. “Madrid just keeps getting hotter.”
Italy placed 21 cities on red alert, including important ones, such as Rome, Milan and Naples. Emergency rooms reported a 10 percent rise in heatstroke cases, according to Mario Guarino of the Italian Society of Emergency Medicine.
Portugal also faced extreme conditions, with the capital, Lisbon, under a red warning until Monday night. Two-thirds of the country was on high alert for wildfires and extreme heat.
On the island of Sicily, firefighters tackled 15 blazes on Saturday alone.
Scientists warn that climate change is intensifying the heat.
“Heatwaves in the Mediterranean have become more frequent and more intense in recent years,” Emanuela Piervitali of Italy’s Institute for Environmental Protection and Research told AFP. “We’ll need to adapt to even higher extremes in the future.”
Syria’s Civil Defence teams are battling wildfires sweeping through northeastern Syria, with the coastal region of Latakia among the worst hit. Emergency workers expressed concerns that unexploded ordnance from the war might be contributing to the rapid spread of the flames.
Three have died as blaze continues to rage in southern coastal area of Dortyol in Hatay province, which borders Syria.
A forestry worker injured in a wildfire in the western Turkish province of Izmir has died from his injuries, raising the death toll in recent days from the fires to three, as the blaze in villages of the Odemis district was brought under control but emergency crews continued to battle one in a province bordering Syria.
Worker Ragip Sahin “who was injured while fighting the fire in Odemis and was being treated in hospital, has died”, Agriculture and Forestry Minister Ibrahim Yumakli said on Saturday in a post on X. Yumakli also said the blaze in Odemis had been brought under control by Friday evening alongside six other wildfires, mostly in western and central Turkiye.
He added that firefighters were still trying to control a blaze in the southern coastal area of Dortyol in Hatay province.
Turkiye was mostly spared the recent searing heatwaves that engulfed the rest of southern Europe, but firefighters have battled more than 600 fires since June 26 in the drought-hit nation, which have been prompted by high winds.
The fire in Odemis, about 100km (60 miles) east of the resort city of Izmir, had on Thursday killed a bedridden 81-year-old man and a backhoe operator who died while helping firefighting efforts.
In a video on X, Odemis Mayor Mustafa Turan said the fire had ravaged about 5,000 hectares (12,400 acres) of land. “The fire came violently to this area, there is nothing left to burn. About 5,000 hectares was reduced to ashes,” said Turan.
On Monday, rescuers evacuated more than 50,000 people to escape a string of fires.
“According to the authorities, the fires that lasted for four days started in Tusurman village … you can still see smoke coming out from this evacuated village,” said Al Jazeera’s Sinem Koseoglu, reporting from Odemis.
“Nothing is left in this village, no one is living here and there is nothing left to reside in. After the fires erupted due to electrical cables in this village, it quickly spread to the nearby villages on this side and then to other villages. Just on the first night [of the wildfires], authorities had to evacuate five villages,” she added.
“For citizens of Turkiye living in the valleys and forests, life is becoming more difficult every year as climate change brings more wildfires. And this year, wildfires came earlier than expected to Turkiye,” said Koseoglu.
Turkiye sends help to Syria
In the meantime, in Hatay province, which borders Syria, emergency crews continued fighting a blaze that broke out Friday afternoon in the Dortyol district near a residential area and rapidly intensified due to strong winds, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported.
Some 920 homes had been evacuated as a precaution against the advancing flames, Governor Mustafa Musatli said late Friday.
Turkiye also sent two firefighting aircraft on Saturday to help neighbouring Syria battle wildfires in its northwest Latakia region.
Eleven fire trucks and water support vehicles were also dispatched, according to Raed al-Saleh, the Syrian Minister of Emergency and Disaster Management.
Turkiye’s Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said 44 suspects have been detained in relation to 65 fires that broke out across the country, which led to the evacuation of tens of thousands of people and damaged some 200 homes.
According to the European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS) website, there have been 96 wildfires in Turkiye this year that have ravaged more than 49,652 hectares (122,700 acres) of land.
Experts say human-driven climate change is causing more frequent and intense wildfires and other natural disasters, and have warned Turkiye to take measures to tackle the problem.
The intensity of the Turkey wildfires has grown as the week continues, with more than 50,000 people having to flee their homes from across İzmir and surrounding provinces
(Image: Anadolu via Getty Images)
Tens of thousands of people have fled their homes as ferocious wildfires rage across Turkey.
For the past three days, forest fires whipped up by robust winds have wreaked havoc in İzmir, which sits in the west of the country in an area loved by British tourists. Those flying into the region have captured videos of the sky burning orange above the city of 2.9 million, with great plumes of smoke billowing up off the tinder-box dry countryside.
The intensity of the fires has grown as the week continues, with more than 50,000 people having to flee their homes from across İzmir and surrounding provinces.
In Sakarya, 230 people have had to leave behind two neighborhoods, while seven villages have been deserted by 609 people in Bilecik. İzmir’s Seferihisar district is the worst-impacted. There, 42,300 have had to flee an area that is made up of 80% summer houses, CNN Türk reported.
Helicopter pilots and on-the-ground firefighters are working side-by-side with teams of citizens who are determined to save as much of their land and as many of their homes as possible. They used tractors with water trailers and helicopters carrying water to douse the charred hillsides.
Minister of Agriculture and Forestry İbrahim Yumaklı said that 342 forest fires have broken out since Friday.
Mr Yumaklı said on Monday that the blaze was fanned overnight by winds reaching 40-50 km/h in Kuyucak and Doğanbey areas of İzmir. The first fire broke out on Sunday between the districts of Seferihisar and Menderes in İzmir, spreading rapidly due to winds of up to 117 km/h, according to Governor Süleyman Elban.
Residents in the village of Ürkmez were forced to cut trees to create firebreaks and protect their homes.
On Sunday, no flights could land at or take off from Adnan Menderes Airport, which serves the coastal city of İzmir, for several hours. The airport’s departure board showed all flights due to leave on Sunday evening were either suspended or canceled.
Since then, the airport has been running as normal, with the departures and arrivals boards today showing no delays or cancellations.
The area was also hit by wildfires last year, as were many of Turkey’s other coastal areas. It is likely that this will become a more and more regular occurrence in the country, as climate change increases the irregularity of weather patterns and raises temperatures.
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Turkey is not the only European country impacted by blazes this week. Right now, a sweltering ‘heat dome’ is sitting across swathes of Europe including France, Portugal, Spain, and Turkey, with forecasts from European meteorologists warning that more roasting days are on the horizon.
“Extreme heat is no longer a rare event — it has become the new normal,” declared U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres via Twitter from Seville, Spain, where the mercury was projected to soar to a blistering 42 Celsius by Monday afternoon.
Echoing his oft-repeated plea for dramatic measures to curb climate change, Guterres proclaimed: “The planet is getting hotter & more dangerous — no country is immune.”
Firefighters are battling wildfires for the second day in Turkiye’s western province of Izmir, according to local authorities and media reports.
The blaze in Kuyucak and Doganbey areas of Izmir was fanned overnight by winds reaching 40-50kmph (25-30mph), and four villages and two neighbourhoods had been evacuated, Forestry Minister Ibrahim Yumakli said on Monday.
Helicopters, fire-extinguishing aircraft and other vehicles, and more than 1,000 people were trying to extinguish the fires, he told reporters in Izmir.
Turkiye’s coastal regions have been ravaged by wildfires in recent years as summers have become hotter and drier, which scientists relate to climate change.
Izmir’s airport suspends flights, and authorities evacuate residents as strong winds fan blaze in the western province.
Turkiye has evacuated four villages and two neighbourhoods in its western province of Izmir as firefighters battle wildfires for the second day, according to local authorities.
Forestry Minister Ibrahim Yumakli said on Monday that the blaze was fanned overnight by winds reaching 40-50kmph (25-30mph) in Kuyucak and Doganbey areas of Izmir.
Helicopters, fire-extinguishing aircraft and other vehicles, and more than 1,000 people were trying to extinguish the fires, Yumakli told reporters in Izmir.
Operations at Izmir Adnan Menderes airport were suspended due to the fire, Turkish media reported.
Media footage showed teams using tractors with water trailers and helicopters carrying water, as smoke billowed over hills marked with charred trees.
An aerial view of the damaged houses and burned forest area after the fire broke out in Seferihisar district of Izmir, Turkiye on June 30, 2025 [Mahmut Serdar Alakus/Anadolu]
Earlier, strong winds grounded the helicopters, leaving two water-bombing aircraft and a large ground crew struggling to battle the flames.
The first fire broke out on Sunday between the districts of Seferihisar and Menderes in Izmir, spreading swiftly due to winds of up to 117kmph (75mph), according to Governor Suleyman Elban.
Five neighbourhoods in Seferihisar have been evacuated as the fire approaches residential areas, the governor added.
Residents in the village of Urkmez were forced to cut trees to create firebreaks and protect their homes, a witness told the AFP news agency over the phone.
A separate blaze ignited at a landfill in Gaziemir, 13km (8 miles) from central Izmir, spreading to nearby woodland and threatening the Otokent industrial zone, home to several car dealerships.
One dealership was seen ablaze in footage broadcast by Turkish channel NTV.
Turkiye’s coastal regions have in recent years been ravaged by wildfires, as summers have become hotter and drier, which scientists relate to climate change. Last year, the same area in Izmir was also hit by a massive wildfire.
Elsewhere
Across Southern Europe, firefighters were also mobilised as people sought shelter from the punishing temperatures of a heatwave that is set to intensify in the coming days.
In France, wildfires broke out in the Corbieres area of Aude in the southwest, where temperatures topped 40C (104F), forcing the evacuation of a campsite and abbey as a precaution.
Last week, Greek firefighters had to battle a forest blaze on the coast south of Athens that forced some evacuations.
Several areas in the southern half of Portugal, including Lisbon, were also under a red warning until Monday night, said the Portuguese Institute for Sea and Atmosphere.
Houses were damaged after a wildfire broke out in the Doganbey area of Seferihisar district in Izmir, Turkiye, on June 29, 2025 [Mahmut Serdar Alakus/Anadolu]
Southern California Edison’s admission that its equipment may have ignited the Hurst fire in the San Fernando Valley on Jan. 7 is being seized on by lawyers suing the utility company for another fire in the same area nearly six years earlier.
Both the Saddleridge fire in 2019 and the Hurst fire this year started beneath an Edison high-voltage transmission line in Sylmar. The lawyers say faulty equipment on the line ignited both blazes in the same way.
“The evidence will show that five separate fires ignited at five separate SCE transmission tower bases in the same exact manner as the fire that started the Saddleridge fire,” the lawyers wrote of the Hurst fire in a June 9 filing in Los Angeles Superior Court.
The lawyers said the January wildfire is “further evidence” that a transmission pylon known as Tower 2-5 “is improperly grounded.”
Edison told the state Public Utilities Commission in February that “absent additional evidence, SCE believes its equipment may be associated with the ignition of the Hurst Fire.” But the company denies claims that its equipment sparked the 2019 fire, which tore through Sylmar, Porter Ranch and Granada Hills — all suburbs of Los Angeles — burning 8,799 acres.
“We will continue to focus on facts and evidence — not on preposterous and sensational theories that only serve to harm the real victims,” said Edison spokesman David Eisenhauer. He declined further comment on the case.
The Saddleridge wildfire destroyed or damaged more than 100 homes and other structures, according to Cal Fire, and caused at least one death when resident Aiman El Sabbagh suffered a cardiac arrest.
Edison is being sued by insurance companies, including State Farm and USAA, to recoup the cost of damages paid to their policyholders. Homeowners and other victims are also seeking damages. A jury trial for the consolidated cases is set for Nov. 4.
In their June 9 filing, the plaintiffs’ lawyers also claimed Edison wasn’t transparent with officials looking into the cause of the 2019 fire. One fire official characterized the utility’s action as “deceptive,” the filing said.
Edison discovered a fault on its system at 8:57 p.m. — just three minutes before the blaze at the base of its transmission tower was reported to the Fire Department by Sylmar resident Robert Delgado, according to the court filing.
But Edison didn’t tell the Los Angeles city Fire Department about the fault it recorded, the filing said. Instead the fire department’s investigation team discovered the failure on Edison’s transmission lines through dash cam footage recorded by a motorist driving on the 210 Freeway nearby, the filing said.
When Timothy Halloran, a city Fire Department investigator, went to the location of the flash shown on the motorist’s camera, he found “evidence of a failure on SCE’s equipment,” the filing said.
Halloran said in a deposition that employees of the business located where the evidence was found told him that Edison employees “attempted to purchase” footage from the company’s security camera on the night of the fire, the filing said.
“The video footage shows a large flash emanating from the direction of SCE Transmission Tower 5-2,” the filing said.
Halloran testified in his deposition that he believed Edison was trying to be “deceptive” for attempting to purchase the security camera footage and not reporting the system fault to the Fire Department, the lawyers said.
Halloran didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Edison’s maintenance of its transmission lines is now being scrutinized as it faces dozens of lawsuits from victims of the devastating Eaton fire, which also ignited on Jan. 7.
Videos showed that fire, which killed 18 people and destroyed thousands of homes, starting under a transmission tower in Eaton Canyon. The investigation into the cause of the fire is continuing.
Victims of the 2019 fire say they’ve become disheartened as Edison has repeatedly asked for delays in the court case.
“Many plaintiffs have not yet been able to rebuild their homes” because of the delays, wrote Mara Burnett, a lawyer representing the family of the man who died.
Burnett noted that Aiman El Sabbagh was 54 when he suffered a fatal cardiac arrest during the incident. His children, Tala and Adnan El Sabbagh, “feel they were robbed of things they treasured and worked hard for with no apparent recompense in sight.”
Both the Saddleridge and Hurst fires included a similar chain of events where a failure of equipment on one tower resulted in two or more fires igniting under different towers elsewhere on the line, according to lawyers for the plaintiffs.
Edison designed and constructed the towers that run through Sylmar in 1970. They hold up two transmission lines: the Gould-Sylmar 220 kV circuit and the Eagle Rock-Sylmar 220 kV circuit.
In the case of the Saddleridge fire, investigators from the Los Angeles Fire Department and the California Public Utilities Commission found that at 8:57 pm on Oct. 10, 2019, a Y-shaped steel part holding up a transmission line failed, causing the line to fall on a steel arm.
The failure caused a massive electrical fault, lawyers for the plaintiffs say, that sparked fires at two transmission towers that were more than two miles away.
State and city fire investigators say the Saddleridge fire began under one of those towers. And they found unusual burning at the footing of the other tower, according to a report by an investigator at the utilities commission.
The utilities commission investigator said in the report that he found that Edison had violated five state regulations by not properly maintaining or designing its transmission equipment.
This year’s Hurst fire ignited not far away on Jan. 7 at 10:10 p.m. It also began under one of Edison’s transmission towers.
According to Edison’s Feb. 6 report to the utilities commission, the company found that its hardware failed, resulting in equipment falling to the ground at the base of a tower.
The lawyers for the plaintiffs say that they now have more evidence of the fire’s start. They say that investigators found that the hardware failure set off an event — similar to the 2019 fire — that resulted in five fires at five separate transmission tower bases on the same line.
One of those fires spread in high winds to become the Hurst fire. Officials ordered 44,000 people to evacuate. Air tankers and 300 firefighters contained the fire before it reached any homes.
Wildfires have broken out in several European countries loved by British holidaymakers, with Greece, Portugal, Spain, Italy, Turkey and France all impacted as a powerful heatwaves roasts the Continent
Milo Boyd Digital Travel Reporter and ELENA BECATOROS
07:30, 28 Jun 2025
Wildfires have been breaking out across Europe (Image: DIMITRIS TOSIDIS, SOOC/AFP via Getty Images)
Wildfires have broken out across Europe as the Continent battles with ferociously hot temperatures.
The mercury could reach a ferocious 47°C in Spain this weekend, while road surfaces are beginning to melt in Italy. Those in France, Portugal, Turkey and Greece are also struggling to deal with stifling, brutally hot days and nights.
As well as the heat being a danger to the health of locals and holidaymakers alike, with one tourist already having lost their life to heatstroke in Majorca, the risk of wildfires is sky high in countries across Europe, and have already broken out in several.
It’s unlikely the heat will relent anytime soon, thanks to the heat dome currently hanging over Europe. The meteorological phenomenon occurs when a high-pressure ridge traps a thick layer of warm air in one region, acting like a lid on a pot.
The impact of human-driven climate change has only made the risk of such heatwaves worse.
The roasting temperatures are not just a threat to life, but increase the chance of wildfires (Image: Copyright 2019 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)
Greece
Greece has borne the brunt of the wildfires in Europe so far this summer, with serious blazes breaking out in several areas.
A fierce blaze ripped through the area south of Athens on Thursday, leading to evacuation orders and forcing officials to shut off sections of the vital coastal route from the Greek capital to Sounion — home of the historic Temple of Poseidon and a key draw for visitors.
As a dozen aircraft and helicopters swooped in to combat the blaze from above, they supported a ground operation of 130 firefighters and their volunteer counterparts near Palaia Fokaia, on the outskirts of Athens.
The coast guard announced that two patrol boats and nine private vessels were on standby in the Palaia Fokaia area, ready for a potential sea evacuation. Fire department spokesperson Vassilis Vathrakogiannis revealed that 40 individuals had been evacuated by police, while evacuation orders were issued for five areas in total.
The wider Athens area, along with several Aegean islands, is currently on Level 4 of a 5-level scale for wildfire risk due to weather conditions, with the heatwave predicted to persist until the weekend.
Earlier this week, it took hundreds of firefighters four days to control a significant wildfire on the eastern Aegean island of Chios. Over a dozen evacuation orders were issued for Chios, where the flames consumed forests and farmland.
Wildfires are a common occurrence in Greece during its sweltering, arid summers. In 2018, a colossal fire engulfed the coastal town of Mati, east of Athens, trapping residents in their homes and on escape routes. The disaster claimed over 100 lives, including some who tragically drowned while attempting to swim away from the inferno.
Authorities have been fighting the fires in Charakas near Athens (Image: Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)
Spain
So far, wildfires have been limited in Spain, but the threat is rising as the country braces for seriously high temperatures over the coming days. The mercury could reach a ferocious 47°C in Spain this weekend.
On Thursday, a forest fire broke out in the Talavera de la Reina region, creating a column of smoke visible from the city. A total of 10 vehicles — two of them aerial — and 38 personnel were called in to put it out.
The Canary Islands government has issued a warning for Gran Canaria starting this Saturday due to high temperatures across the entire island. There is a risk of forest fires at altitudes above 400 metres.
Temperatures in Gran Canaria are expected to exceed 34°C this weekend and will likely approach 37°C, with strong winds increasing the danger. The Canary Islands government is urging the public to avoid lighting fires — even in barbecues or recreational areas — and to avoid using tools or machinery that could produce sparks, such as chainsaws, brush cutters, or welders.
A pre-alert for heat has been issued for the rest of the archipelago, with temperatures expected to be around 30–34°C (86–93°F) on El Hierro, La Gomera, Lanzarote, and Fuerteventura, as well as on the eastern, southern, and western slopes of Tenerife, and 26–32°C (79–90°F) on the northern coast of Gran Canaria.
Fires broke out in Tenerife in May(Image: AP)
Portugal
Wildfires are serious business in Portugal.
Last year, there were 6,267 individual wildfires recorded, with 16 people losing their lives as a result. In total, 137,000 hectares were destroyed — an area four times larger than the previous year. So far this year, 22 people have been arrested for arson, according to Público.
The total financial loss last year in Portugal — including materials, biomass for energy, fruits, and stored carbon — reached around 67 million euros and affected 2.36 million cubic metres of wood.
While last year was, hopefully, an outlier in terms of wildfire severity, with temperatures nudging 40°C in parts of Portugal this weekend, blazes are likely.
Italy
The boot-shaped country is also facing the risk of wildfires this weekend, with unrelenting sunshine and highs nudging 40°C in the south.
Today, two fires broke out near Rome and in Dragoncello. Flames and smoke rose up, threatening to engulf several properties.
Smoke and flame rise as firefighters continue to extinguish the wildfire that broke out in Aliaga district of Izmir(Image: Anadolu, Anadolu via Getty Images)
Turkey
Wildfires broke out in eight provinces in Turkey on a single day this week. Most were in western provinces — areas where many Europeans travel on holiday.
All fires were brought under control after coordinated air and ground efforts. According to the General Directorate of Forestry, five of the fires began in rural areas and later spread to nearby forests. “Fifty percent of wildfires start in agricultural zones. Small acts of negligence can lead to major disasters,” the authority warned, urging the public not to “set our future on fire.”
One of the most dangerous blazes broke out in the Osmangazi district of the northwestern province of Bursa. Fueled by strong winds, the flames quickly spread from forested areas to nearby residential zones.
France has yet to be hit by major wildfires this year, but firefighters are on high alert this weekend.
The Bouches-du-Rhône is on orange alert, and the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence and Vaucluse are on yellow alert due to the intense heat expected to persist into the weekend. Strong winds may make matters more difficult to control if a blaze does break out.
According to La Provence, the “risk of major fires is high.”
Let me know if you’d like this shortened or rewritten for publication (e.g., news website, print, or social media).
HOPLAND, Calif. — On a sun-kissed hillside in remote Northern California, I watched in awe as a crackling fire I’d helped ignite engulfed a hillside covered in tall, golden grass. Then the wind shifted slightly, and the dense gray smoke that had been billowing harmlessly up the slope turned and engulfed me.
Within seconds, I was blind and coughing. The most intense heat I’d ever felt seemed like it would sear the only exposed skin on my body: my face. As the flames inched closer, to within a few feet, I backed up until I was trapped against a tall fence with nowhere left to go.
Alone in that situation, I would have panicked. But I was with Len Nielson, chief of prescribed burns for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, who stayed as cool as the other side of the pillow.
Like a pilot calmly instructing passengers to fasten their seat belts, Nielson suggested I wrap the fire-resistant “shroud” hanging from my bright yellow helmet around my face. Then he told me to take a few steps to the left.
And, just like that, we were out of the choking smoke and into the gentle morning sunlight. The temperature seemed to have dropped a few hundred degrees.
“It became uncomfortable, but it was tolerable, right?” Nielson asked with a reassuring grin. “Prescribed fires are a lot about trust.”
Dripping gasoline onto dry grass and deliberately setting it ablaze in the California countryside felt wildly reckless, especially for someone whose job involves interviewing survivors of the state’s all too frequent, catastrophic wildfires. But “good fire,” as Nielson called it, is essential for reducing the fuel available for bad fire, the kind that makes the headlines. The principle is as ancient as it is simple.
Before European settlers arrived in California and insisted on suppressing fire at every turn, the landscape burned regularly. Sometimes lightning ignited the flames; sometimes it was Indigenous people using fire as an obvious, and remarkably effective, tool to clear unwanted vegetation from their fields. Whatever the cause, it was common for much of the land in California to burn about once a decade.
“So it was relatively calm,” Nielson said, as the flames we’d set danced and swirled just a few feet behind him. “There wasn’t this big fuel load, so there wasn’t a chance of it becoming really intense.”
With that in mind, the state set an ambitious goal in the early 2020s to deliberately burn at least 400,000 acres of wilderness each year. The majority of that would have to be managed by the federal government, since agencies including the U.S. Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management and the National Park Service own nearly half of the state’s total land. And they own more than half of the state’s forests.
Cal Fire crew members set a prescribed burn near Hopland in Mendocino County.
(Josh Edelson / For The Times)
But California officials worry their ambitious goals are likely to be thwarted by deep cuts to those federal agencies by Elon Musk’s budget-whacking White House advisory team, dubbed the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. In recent months, the Forest Service has lost about 10% of its workforce to mass layoffs and firings. While firefighters were exempt from the DOGE-ordered staffing cuts, employees who handle the logistics and clear the myriad regulatory hurdles to secure permission for prescribed burns were not.
“To me, it’s an objective fact that these cuts mean California will be less safe from wildfire,” said Wade Crowfoot, California’s secretary of natural resources. He recalled how President Trump, in his first term, erroneously blamed the state’s wildfires on state officials who, Trump said, had failed to adequately “rake” the forests.
“Fifty-seven percent of our forests are owned and managed by the federal government,” Crowfoot said. If anybody failed, it was the president, he argued.
Larry Moore, a spokesman for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which oversees the Forest Service, said the job cuts won’t affect the agency’s fire prevention efforts.
The Forest Service “continues to ensure it has the strongest and most prepared wildland firefighting force in the world,” Moore wrote in an email. The agency’s leaders are “committed to preserving essential safety positions and will ensure that critical services remain uninterrupted.”
Cal Fire crew members plot out the direction and scope of a prescribed burn in Mendocino County.
(Josh Edelson / For The Times)
Nevertheless, last month, Gov. Gavin Newsom added $72 million to the state’s forest management budget to bridge some of the gap expected to be left by federal agencies. But wildfire experts say that’s just a drop in the bucket. Doing prescribed burns safely takes a lot of boots on the ground and behind-the-scenes cajoling to make sure local residents, and regulators, are on board.
Because people get pretty testy when you accidentally smoke out an elementary school or old folks home, burn plans have to clear substantial hurdles presented by the California Environmental Quality Act and air quality regulators.
It took three years to get all the required permissions for the 50-acre Hopland burn in Mendocino County, where vineyard owners worried their world-class grapes might get a little too “smoky” for most wine lovers. When the big day finally arrived in early June, more than 60 firefighters showed up with multiple fire engines, at least one bulldozer and a firefighting helicopter on standby in case anything went wrong.
But this was no school project. A fire that began in the surrounding hills a couple of years ago threatened to trap people in the center, so the area being burned was along the only two roads that could be used to escape.
“We’re trying to create a buffer to get out, if we need to,” said John Bailey, the center’s director. “But we’re also trying to create a buffer to prevent wildfire from coming into the center.”
Smoke emanates from a prescribed burn in Mendocino County.(Josh Edelson / For The Times)
As the firefighters pulled on their protective yellow jackets and pants, and filled their drip torches with a mixture of diesel and gasoline, Nielson bent down and grabbed a fistful of the yellow grass. Running it through his fingers, he showed it to his deputies and they all shook their heads in disappointment — too moist.
Thick marine-layer clouds filled the sky at 7 a.m, keeping the relative humidity too high for a good scorching. In many years of covering wildfires, it was the first time I had seen firefighters looking bored and disappointed because nothing would burn.
By 8:45 a.m., the clouds cleared, the sun came out, and the grass in Nielson’s fist began to crinkle and snap. It was time to go to work.
The fire that would fill the sky and drift north that afternoon, blanketing the town of Ukiah with the familiar orange haze of fire season, began with a single firefighter walking along the edge of a cleared dirt path. As he moved, he made little dots of flame with his drip torch, drawing a line like a kid working the edges of a picture in a coloring book.
Additional firefighters worked the other edges of the field until it was encircled by strips of burned black grass. That way, no matter which direction the fire went when they set the center of the field alight, the flames would not — in most circumstances — escape the relatively small test patch.
On the uphill edge of the patch, along the top of a ridge, firefighters in full protective gear leaned against a wooden fence with their backs to the smoke and flames climbing the hill behind them. They’d all done this before, and they trusted those black strips of pre-burned grass to stop the fire before it got to them.
Their job was to keep their eyes on the downward slope on the other side of the ridge, which wasn’t supposed to burn. If they saw any embers drift past them into the “green” zone, they would immediately move to extinguish those flames.
Nielson and I were standing along the fence, too. In addition to the circle of pre-burned grass protecting us, we were on a dirt path about four feet wide. For someone with experience, that was an enormous buffer. I was the only one who even flinched when the smoke and flames came our way.
Afterward, when I confessed how panicked I had felt, Nielson said it happens to a lot of people the first time they are engulfed in smoke. It’s particularly dangerous in grass fires, because they move so fast. People can get completely disoriented, run the wrong way and “get cooked,” he said.
Grass fires are particularly dangerous, because they move so fast, says Cal Fire Staff Chief Len Nielson. People can get disoriented in the smoke, run the wrong way and “get cooked.”
(Josh Edelson / For The Times)
But that test patch was just the warmup act. Nielson and his crew were checking to make sure the fire would behave the way they expected — pushed in the right direction by the gentle breeze and following the slope uphill.
“If you’re wondering where fire will go and how fast it will move, think of water,” he said. Water barely moves on flat ground, but it picks up speed when it goes downhill. If it gets into a steep section, where the walls close in like a funnel, it becomes a waterfall.
“Fire does the same thing, but it’s a gas, so it goes the opposite direction,” Nielson said.
With that and a few other pointers — we watched as three guys drew a line of fire around the base of a big, beautiful oak tree in the middle of the hillside to shield it from what was about to happen — Nielson led me to the bottom of the hill and handed me a drip torch.
Once everybody was in position, and all of the safety measures had been put in place, he wanted me to help set the “head fire,” a 6-foot wall of flame that would roar up the hill and consume dozens of acres in a matter of minutes.
“It’s gonna get a little warm right here,” Nielson said, “but it’s gonna get warm for only a second.”
As I leaned in with the torch and set the grass ablaze, the heat was overwhelming. While everyone else working the fire seemed nonchalant, I was tentative and terrified. My right hand stretched forward to make the dots and dashes where Nielson instructed, but my butt was sticking as far back into the road as it could get.
I asked Nielson how hot he thought the flames in front of us were. “I used to know that,” he said with a shrug. “I want to say it’s probably between 800 and 1,200 degrees.”
With the hillside still burning, I peeled off all of the protective gear, hopped in a car and followed the smoke north along the 101 Freeway. By lunchtime, Ukiah, a town of 16,000 that bills itself as the gateway to the redwoods, was shrouded in haze.
Everybody smelled the smoke, but prescribed burns are becoming so common in the region, nobody seemed alarmed.
“Do it!” said Judy Hyler, as she and two friends walked out of Stan’s Maple Cafe. A veteran of the rampant destruction of wildfires from years past, she didn’t hesitate when asked how she felt about the effort. “I would rather it be prescribed, controlled and managed than what we’ve seen before.”
![A firefighter walks past a burned house after a wildfire swept through Pikermi suburb, east of Athens, Greece, 03 July 2025. [George Vitsaras/EPA]](https://www.occasionaldigest.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/13167788-1751876328.jpg)
