SANTIAGO (HRNW) – Chilean firefighters were battling to hold back forest fires on Monday as authorities said hot and dry weather would continue this week, potentially exacerbating what are already the deadliest blazes in the country’s recent history.
The fires, which have consumed 270,000 hectares (667,000 acres) of land, have killed 24 people so far in south-central Chile, and already made 2023 the second worst year in terms of hectares burned after the so-called “fire storm” that hit the country in 2017.
The state National Forestry Corporation reported that as of Monday morning there were 275 active fires, of which 69 were currently in combat.
“Unity to face the tragedy, unity to rebuild ourselves,” President Gabriel Boric wrote on Twitter.
Chile is in the grip of an over decade-long period of dry weather, which the World Meteorological Organization called a “mega drought” last year, adding it was the longest in a thousand years and marked a major water crisis.