Torrefeta Fire: 1,800 Hectares Burned in Lleida
- A burning fire on Tuesday night in the Catalan regions of the Segarra, La Noguera and Urgell, in Lleida.
- The Civil Protection Service has requested the confinement of nine municipalities: Vilanova de la Acute, Artesa de Segre, Ponts, Cabanabona, Oliola, Guissona, Sanaüja and Torrefeta I Florejacs and...
- Both fires have been aggravated by the strong wind that comes from the summer storms generated in the Pallars mountains as a result of high temperatures.
A burning fire on Tuesday night in the Catalan regions of the Segarra, La Noguera and Urgell, in Lleida. The fire carries more than 1,800 hectares calcined, mostly agricultural, and until 20.30h. In the afternoon he has been “out of extinction capacity”, as reported by firefighters, but it is no longer there. The flames have caused a large 14 -kilometer black smoke column, something never seen in Catalonia.
The Civil Protection Service has requested the confinement of nine municipalities: Vilanova de la Acute, Artesa de Segre, Ponts, Cabanabona, Oliola, Guissona, Sanaüja and Torrefeta I Florejacs and Agramunt (Urgell). The flames have started in Torrefeta a few minutes after 5:00 p.m. In the same region of the Segarra three hours before another fire had been declared, which after a first control phase has been revived throughout the afternoon.
Both fires have been aggravated by the strong wind that comes from the summer storms generated in the Pallars mountains as a result of high temperatures. Although it rains in some parts of the fires, the winds above 90 kilometers per hour cause “erratic” behaviors in the fires, the Generalitat firefighters have explained.
The bad wind conditions, the high temperatures and the erratic behavior of the flames causes that “the extinction strategy to safeguard the safety of the troops on an area of more than 2,000 hectares, have added firefighters, are needed continuously”.
To protect the population from the flames and the large column of smoke, which has formed a pyrocumulus of 14,000 meters of altitude, a phenomenon of dimensions never observed in Catalonia, 25,512 hectares and nine municipalities have been confined.
In Torrefeta there are destined 33 land vehicles, 10 air endowments of command and extinction and 102 troops. In the Sanaüja fire, 15 endowments are intended, of which 2 aerial, one of command and a bomber, with 48 troops.
Regarding the involvement of mobility, the Catalan Traffic Service informs that traffic in the L-313 has been cut in both directions between Ponts and Guissona, between kilometers 4 and 20.
According to provisional data of the Corps of Rural Agents, the fire initiated in the municipality of Torrefeta and Florejacs affects an approximate area of 1,807 hectares, mainly of agricultural land. The municipalities with burned surface are: Torrefeta and Florejacs (Segarra), Vilanova de l’Acuda (Noguera), Cabanabona (Noguera) and oliola (Noguera).
Virtually the entire affected surface is within the limits of the protected natural space, Valls del Sió-Llobregós, an area of high natural and landscape value. The Rural Agent Corps has activated the investigation protocols to determine the origin of the fire and coordinates the affectation on the natural protected values of space.