15 killed in Algeria wildfires fanned by winds, extreme heat

Wildfires raging across Algeria during a blistering heatwave have killed at least 15 people and forced mass evacuations, the government said on Monday.

As temperatures hit 48 degrees Celsius (118 Fahrenheit), the North African country recorded 97 blazes across 16 provinces, fanned by strong winds, said the interior ministry.

The fires injured 26 people and raged through residential areas, it said, adding that most had been put out.

Some 1,500 people were evacuated from the Bejaia, Bouira and Jijel provinces east of the capital Algiers, according to the ministry.

The three provinces in Algeria's Mediterranean coastal region have seen the worst of the fires.

The interior ministry said that 7,500 firefighters and 350 firetrucks were mobilised to fight the flames, aided by aerial fire-fighting support.

Operations were underway to extinguish fires in six provinces, it added, calling on citizens to "avoid areas affected by the fires" and to report new blazes on toll-free phone numbers.

"Civil protection services remain mobilised until the fires are completely extinguished," the ministry said.

Mediterranean heatwave 

Fires regularly rage through forests and fields in Algeria in summer, and this year have been exacerbated by a heatwave that has seen several Mediterranean countries break temperature records.

In neighbouring Tunisia, temperatures on Monday neared 50 degrees Celsius.

Last week, a major blaze raged in a Tunisian pine forest near the border with Algeria.

A border crossing had to close temporarily, according to Tunisian officials who confirmed 470 hectares (1,100 acres) of forest had been burned.

In some other North African countries such as Morocco and Libya, temperatures were relatively normal compared to annual averages.

Algeria's state energy firm Sonelgaz on Sunday reported a peak in electricity consumption at 18,697 megawatts.

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In May, authorities said they were preparing for wildfires by purchasing and renting water bombers, and constructing landing strips for helicopters and fire-fighting drones.

In August 2022, massive blazes killed 37 in Algeria's northeastern El Tarf province.

It was preceded by the deadliest summer in decades, with 90 people killed in such fires in 2021, particularly the Kabylie region.

Scientists rank the Mediterranean region as a climate-change "hot spot", with the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warning of more heatwaves, crop failures, droughts, rising seas and influxes of invasive species.