Flames from more than 100 raging wildfires in Chile continue to spread quickly from the mountains to the Pacific Ocean, destroying forests, livestock and whole towns in a destructive path that is now dangerously close to the coastal city of Concepcion.
Authorities say they found a body Friday, raising the overall death toll to 11. About 118 fires remain active and 53 of those are contained.
Officials are hopeful that light rains and lower temperatures Friday will provide some relief. But the flames have picked up near two residential condominiums in the city of Concepcion, about 310 miles (500 kilometers) from the Chilean capital.
The ferocity of the flames prompted President Michelle Bachelet’s to declare a state of emergency, deploy troops and ask for international help, calling it “the greatest forest disaster” in Chile’s history.
Flames from one of Chile’s worst wildfires completely consumed the town of Santa Olga as the death toll from the blazes since Nov. rose to 10, officials said Thursday.
The flames engulfed the post office, a kindergarten, and about 1,000 homes in the town, located 220 miles (360 kilometers) south of the Chilean capital. The body of one person was found under the charred remains of the town, which another 6,000 residents fled unharmed. Officials have not identified the person who died.
“This is an extremely serious situation — of horror, a nightmare without an end,” said Carlos Valenzuela, the mayor of the neighboring coastal city of Constitucion. “Everything burned.”
The series of fast-spreading blazes have destroyed about 385,000 acres (160,000 hectares) of forest. The fires have been raging in central and southern Chile, fanned by strong winds, hot temperatures and a prolonged drought. Emergency services have battled the flames non-stop for days with thousands of firefighters on the ground and helicopters and small airplanes in the air.
Residents of some communities have been battling the fires themselves, without any protective gear and often using just branches or bottles of water in a frantic effort to save their homes, pasture and livestock. But those efforts are often undone as winds or smoldering ash spread the fires anew.
A Boeing 747-400 “Super Tanker” arrived in Chile from the US Wednesday to help fight the blazes. The world’s largest fire-fighting aircraft can dump nearly 20,000 gallons (73,000 liters) of fire retardant or water.
Bachelet said in her Twitter account Thursday that Chile also had accepted a supertanker plane from the Russian government.
The central regions of O’Higgins and Chile’s top wine-making region of Maule are among those hit worst. But fires are also raging in the south-central Bio Bio and Araucania regions, known for its timber industry and where most of Chile’s Mapuche Indigenous people live.

Source: Arab News