Fire

‘Wildfires, the nightmare we have to live with’

Nine people killed – including three firefighters – and more than 170 injured in wildfires ravaging the central and northern regions of the country; in the districts of Aveiro, Porto, Vila Real, Braga, Viseu and Coimbra.

The country’s civil protection service said that last week 54 wildfires were burning nationwide with 5,300 firefighters mobilized. France, Greece, Italy and Spain have sent water-bombing planes through the EU’s mutual assistance program. The fires forced the closure of two railway lines and several motorways, including part of the main road between Lisbon and Porto.

The area burned in mainland Portugal in one week exceeds 135,000 hectares according to the European Earth Observation Service Copernicus, which uses satellite images. In Aveiro alone, the fire consumed more than 10,000 hectares of forest and scrubland in just two days. 

Furthermore, as a result of the fires, carbon emissions (CO2) – used as an indicator to assess the intensity of fires – mounted to 1,9 megatons (million tons) announced Copernicus, the worst value for Portugal in 22 years.

After a wet start this year, Portugal recorded initially 50% fewer wildfires than last year, but extreme temperatures over last weekend amid exceptionally low humidity and strong winds have given rise to blazing fires, despite the government having increased fire-prevention funding by a factor of 10 and doubled its firefighting budget after the deadly wildfires in 2017 claimed 64 lives.

Since the 1st of January, the judicial police detained 42 persons suspected of having set forest fires; 9 of whom are women. Most arsonists act impulsively or when the opportunity arises and is based on emotional suffering (depression, anger, revenge, cognitive deficit) or the excitement of seeing it burn, says Cristina Soeiro, psychologist at the Judicial Police.

Portugal’s prime minister, Luis Montenegro, has said that the people suspected of starting some of the fires would feel the full force of the law, adding that he would ‘spare no effort in repressive action’ when it came to such crimes.

‘Make no mistake. These tragedies are no anomalies but becoming the norm for our shared future’ EU’s crisis management commissioner Janez Lenarčič recently declared in Strasbourg. ‘Europe is the fastest warming continent in the world and particularly vulnerable to extreme weather events.’

The good news for Portugal is that – in the meantime – rain has arrived but a collective approach to tackle the climate breakdown is further away than ever, as long as the world continues burning oil, gas and coal.  

Enjoy the week            Approveite a semana      (pic Público/Sapo)



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Seismic

‘Unfortunately nobody can predict the next earthquake’

On Monday morning August 26 at 05.11 the country was startled by an earthquake 58 kilometres west of Sines, in the district of Setúbal with a magnitude of 5.3 on the Richer scale. No personal or material damage was reported, although there were many phone calls from concerned people seeking information.

According to the National Emergency and Civil Protection Authority (ANEPC) in Oeiras, the earthquake had its epicentre at sea but no tsunami warning was given since the magnitude was less than 6.1.
The tremor was felt in several parts of the country but with greater intensity in Setubal and Lisbon.

‘Although this earthquake can be considered as moderate, one shouldn’t worry too much as the southern part of the country has always been seismic active’, says Joao Duarte, seismologist at IPMA, the Portuguese Institute of the Sea and Atmosphere. But it definitely serves as a wake-up call to invest in risk reduction.

It has to do with two tectonic plates pushing against each other. The African plate moves northwest and lifts the Eurasian plate, which is moving to the east –  along the so-called Azores-Gibraltar fracture.
The earthquake has been classified as the biggest felt in Lisbon since 1969, which had a force of 7.9 and its epicentre 250 km away from Lisbon. That time 13 people died.  

The by far biggest terramoto was in 1755, with a magnitude of 9 on the Richter scale. It developed apocalyptic proportions and completely whipped out the lower part of Lisbon. In memory of that country’s main natural disaster, an Earthquake Museum (Museu do Terramoto) was recently opened in Belem.  

The mayor of Lisbon, Carlos Moedas, declared that ‘the City Council  has been ‘seismically’ assessing more than 1500 municipal buildings over the last two years and that only 10% of the buildings need anti-seismic reinforcement.’

However, almost 70% of Lisbon’s buildings were built before the seismic protection law in 1983, making the capital the second city with the highest seismic risk after Istanbul.

The weekly newspaper Expresso published, that 195,000 Lisbon residents live in homes that were not built to earthquake standards.
Mafra, says the newspaper, is the only municipality on the mainland that has a special ‘escape plan’ for the population in case of such a natural disaster.’

One can only hope not to be surprised by bigger earthquakes than the one that woke many of us up on that early morning of August 26.

Enjoy your week          Approveite a semana      (pic Público/Sapo)


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