About a hundred municipalities in 14 districts at maximum fire risk – Actualidade

What to do to have a safe summer

Portugal is in the critical period of rural fires, which runs from July 1st to September 30th.

During this phase, attention must be paid to risks. These are some of the prevention recommendations:

• Consult the fire risk in your area of ​​residence on here.
• Prepare a evacuation kit containing essential items to be used in case of emergency, such as the most important household documents, first aid kit, usual medication and water and non-perishable food, among other things
• If you notice the presence of people with risky behaviors, inform the authorities;
• Check with your Parish Council or Municipal Council regarding the location of the shelters.

In case of fire, follow these steps:

• Call 112 immediately;
• If you are not in danger and have appropriate clothing (typically long-sleeved clothing, boots and gloves), try to extinguish it with shovels, hoes or branches;
• If the fire is close to your house, notify your neighbors, cut off the gas and thoroughly water the walls and shrubs that surround the house.
• Remove your vehicle from the fire access paths;
• See the full list of recommendations, on here.

Prohibitions:

During the critical period, several prohibitions are in place to minimize the risk of fire. These include:

• Fires without municipal authorization;
• Use of stoves and grills outside authorized spaces;
• Smoking or burning in forest areas;
• Launch balloons from lit fuse and rockets;
• See the full list, on here.

Contacts:

• Emergency Line: 112
• National Emergency and Civil Protection Authority: 800 246 246
• GNR Transit: 808 201 855
• Infrastructures of Portugal: 707 500 501
• SOS Environment and Territory Line: 808 200 520

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The fire risk determined by the IPMA has five levels, ranging from reduced to maximum.

Calculations are obtained from air temperature, relative humidity, wind speed and amount of precipitation in the last 24 hours.

In the wake of the hot weather, the National Authority for Emergency and Civil Protection (ANEPC) warned on Monday of the increased risk of rural fires, especially in the southern regions and in the northern and central interior, due to wind and rising temperature forecast for the next few days.

In a warning to the population, ANEPC highlights an “increase in conditions favorable to the possible occurrence and spread of rural fires”, especially in the southern regions and the central and northern interior.

Source of Civil Protection told Lusa that the district of Santarém will today be on special orange alert, the second most serious of a scale of four, due to the danger of rural fire.

The districts of Aveiro, Braga, Bragança Coimbra, Leiria, Lisbon, Porto, Setúbal, Viana do Castelo, Vila Real and Viseu, will, in the same period, be in a special yellow alert state.

The IPMA predicts the continuation of hot weather, with a gradual rise at least until Friday.

During this week the maximum temperature should vary between 30 and 35 degrees Celsius on the coast, and should reach values ​​between 35 and 40 degrees in the interior regions.

The minimum temperature also tends to increase gradually, with values ​​that should exceed 20 degrees in a large part of the continental territory, especially in the interior and in the eastern Algarve, and which are classified as tropical nights.

According to the IPMA, the temperature values ​​are above the usual for the time of the year and this persistence could lead to a heat wave situation in several places in the country, especially in the interior.

At the origin of the hot weather is an “anticyclone located in the northeast of the Azores, which extends ridge to the Bay of Biscay, together with a depression valley from North Africa to the Iberian Peninsula, originating the transport of a mass of air North Africa which will be responsible for the persistence of high temperature values ​​throughout the week ”.

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