Since the beginning of August, 106 fires have broken out, destroying 800 hectares of forest and 1,800 hectares of coppice, said the Minister of the Interior.
Le Monde with AFP
The balance sheet is heavy. Twenty-six people died, and several dozen others were injured in forest fires which affected fourteen departments in northern Algeria, announced the Algerian Minister of the Interior, Kamel Beldjoud, Wednesday August 17 evening. Twenty-four victims died in El-Tarf, near the border with Tunisia, and two others in Sétif.
Several people suffer from burns or breathing difficulties, but no new figures have been given on the number of injured. A previous statement of civil protection reported four people burned to various degrees and 41 others suffering from breathing difficulties in Souk Ahras, another border town in Tunisia.
Impressive images show residents of this fleeing city in front of the flames. According to local media, more than 350 families left their house in Souk Ahras. The gendarmerie has closed several roads because of the fires.
“Thirty-nine fires in fourteen wilayas [prefectures] are underway,” said civil protection, adding that the wilaya of El-Tarf recorded the greatest number of fires, with sixteen lights, including one Many are still in progress. Water bomber helicopters intervened in three prefectures, including Souk Ahras.
fires each year in the North
Since the beginning of August, 106 fires broke out destroying 800 hectares of forest and 1,800 hectares of coppice, said the Minister of the Interior. “Some of these fires are provoked,” said Beldjoud. With the twenty-six dead this Wednesday, the report of the summer of 2022 is increasing, going to thirty dead.
The most extensive country in Africa, Algeria has only 4.1 million hectares of forests, with a meager reforestation rate, of 1.76 %. Each year, the north of the country is affected by forest fires, but this phenomenon also increases from year to year under the effect of climate change.
The summer of 2021 was the deadliest. At least 90 people died in forest fires that ravaged the north of the country, where more than 100,000 hectares of coppice left smoke.