The emergency services of the Generalitat Valenciana have sent an Es-Alert to the population of Castellón to inform them of the confinement of the neighboring municipalities of Vilavella (3,000 inhabitants) and Artana (2,000) and La Vall d’Uixó (31,000 inhabitants), due to a fire originated in the latter municipality, in the foothills of the Sierra de Espadán. The Castelló Provincial Firefighters confirmed this afternoon that the evacuation of Vilavella residents has begun.
Artana is one of the 19 municipalities that are part of the Espadán natural park, which suffered another fire at the beginning of July that mainly affected Azuébar.
The Vall d’Uixó fire started in several outbreaks, as municipal sources explained to EFE, which suggests it may have been intentional. The first outbreak occurred around 9:30 a.m. in an urban area near a school in Vall d’Uixò, and once firefighters managed to extinguish it, another started about 200 meters away in a more forested area, the same sources indicated. Subsequently, more fires occurred, leading to this current fire, which has not yet been controlled, on a day when a strong westerly wind blew in the area during the morning but has since subsided.
“Every time a fire was put out, another started,” highlighted the same sources, who pointed out that so far about 50 or 60 people have been preventively evacuated due to the proximity of the fire to their homes. In any case, they specified that the fire, which this morning threatened the town of Vall d’Uixò, has shifted north.
Vilavella and Artana are towns in the Plana Baixa region, in the southeast of the province. The fire broke out this morning in a vegetation area, and had already forced the preventive evacuation of residents from an urbanization. Its evolution was negative around 1 p.m. and it has already affected a forest area, according to reports from the Provincial Fire Consortium of the area and the Emergency Coordination Center (CCE) of the Generalitat.
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The CCE had to activate situation 2 of the Special Forest Fire Plan. This situation is established when a fire can seriously affect the population and non-forest assets, requiring the immediate adoption of protection and relief measures, in addition to the possibility of incorporating extraordinary resources.
A total of 10 aerial resources and numerous ground resources are working on extinguishing the fire. The president of the Generalitat, Juanfran Pérez Llorca, has moved to the Advanced Command Post (PMA) to follow the evolution of the extinguishing work firsthand.
The meteorological conditions are “very unfavorable” for the forest fire, east of the Serra d’Espadà, as temperatures of 35 ºC, 15% humidity, and wind gusts of 43 km/h are being recorded, according to Avamet.
Five forest fire brigades from the Provincial Consortium of Castellón, a light vehicle, a heavy tender pump, a chief, and two firefighters from the Castellón City Council have also been mobilized to the scene, while a Civil Guard patrol and Local Police have proceeded with the preventive evacuation of residents.
