Lège-Cap-Ferret (France) (AFP) - Authorities ordered new mass evacuations Friday – with some tourists escaping on boats – as wildfires raced through forests in southwest France and central Spain, forcing tens of thousands of people to flee or hole up indoors.

Spain and France called in European Union help as flames whipped up by strong winds and boosted by drought tore through tinder-dry forests.

Some 44,000 people left the up-market Cap Ferret peninsula south of Bordeaux on France’s Atlantic coast, whose only road out was threatened by flames.

Twenty-seven boats moved hundreds of people away from the fires on Friday, while others drove off the peninsula, known for its millionaire residences. More than 50 houses have been destroyed.

About 40 of the 1,000 firefighters battling the Cap Ferret blaze have been injured, authorities said. Three firefighters have died in wildfires in France and Italy this week.

Some 23,000 people were ordered out of homes and campsites farther south in the Landes region and another 8,000 were told to get away on Friday.

In Spain, authorities said some 40,000 people in the Madrid region were told to evacuate or remain confined to their homes since Wednesday. A government official said more evacuations were possible.

Two of the three major wildfires west of the capital had merged into one, threatening a suburban town, said officials.

“We are living through a dramatic situation, not only in various Spanish provinces but also in regions of neighbouring countries,” said Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez.

- Speeding infernos -

Some European regions have suffered at least two heatwaves since May.

And drought blamed on human-fuelled climate change has heightened the threat from wildfires this year, the World Weather Attribution group said in a study published this week.

French authorities stepped up evacuations as they struggled with the flames on Cap Ferret. Regional fire chief, Marc Vermeulen, said that at times the fire devoured between 800 and 1,000 hectares (2,000-2,500 acres) of forest an hour.

Emergency shelters were set up in schools and gymnasiums for tourists and residents left wondering what they would return to.

In the village of Andernos, Maria Lalanne, a 90-year-old from Lege Cap Ferret, sat on a camp bed in a gym without her glasses or hearing aid, which she’d left behind.

“I have heart disease, high blood pressure and problems with my eyes,” she said. “I don’t know how long all this will last. I don’t know how my house is, whether it has burned.”

- EU help -

Firefighting reinforcements have been sent from across France and, following appeals for assistance, the European Commission said it was sending four water-bombing planes to Spain and three to France.

The fires burning around Madrid were the worst in the region’s history, regional president Isabel Diaz Ayuso said as she announced more evacuations, including more than 430 elderly and disabled moved from five care homes.

Two fires west of Madrid had merged and were heading for the town of Navas del Rey, some 50 kilometres (30 miles) from the capital. The new inferno was close to combining with another wildfire in neighbouring Castilla y Leon region, officials said.

“The smoke was incredibly thick,” Jose Cobos, who fled his home southwest of Madrid with his wife and three dogs, told Antena 3 television as he waited to learn if his house survived. “You couldn’t breathe.”

Spain has been hit by a series of wildfires in recent weeks.

The largest active fire was still burning in Guadalajara province, around 100 km north of Madrid, where it has scorched about 32,000 hectares over the past week.

The French fires at Cap Ferret and around the town of Biscarosse in the Landes have already burned more than 13,500 hectares while another 6,000 hectares has been lost in the Madrid region.

Italy has also been battling wildfires this week with dozens raging on the island of Sicily in recent days. One of the firefighters victim was killed in Sicily. Two others died tackling a fire near Bordeaux airport.

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