LISBON: The fires raging across Portugal claimed their first victim Friday (Aug 15), when the former mayor of the eastern town of Guarda died fighting fires there, President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa announced.
The president offered “heartfelt condolences to the mayor of Guarda for the death of former mayor Carlos Damaso, victim of a fire he was fighting in his parish, asking that he pass them on to his family”, said the president’s statement.
Rebelo de Sousa added that he had cut short his holidays and returned to the presidential palace, joining a meeting of the National Emergency and Civil Protection Authority.
For several days now, several thousand firefighters have been battling fires in various parts of the country.
Like its neighbour Spain, Portugal has invoked the EU’s civil protection mechanism to ask for help, requesting four firefighting aircraft to use until Monday, the presidency said on X.
After devastating fires in 2017 that killed 119 people across the country, Portugal boosted investment on fire prevention tenfold, doubling its budget for fighting forest fires.
It subsequently managed to reduce the amount of land lost to 54,000 hectares (134,000 acres) between 2018 and 2023, a third of what was lost between 2001 and 2017, according to government figures.
Source: CNA
