Rabat – Amid a national heatwave, Moroccan civil authorities are expecting to once again face the threat of increased wildfires.
High temperatures and human carelessness have led to wildfires in Ouazzane that have been ongoing for almost two days. Other regions, such as Laarayech and Taza, have also experienced huge fires.
Read also: Taza Wildfire Destroys Over 180 Hectares of Forest in Morocco
In Ouazzane, where civil protection forces are still combating the fires, the fires are estimated to have decimated around 200 hectares of land. The fires remain challenging to control, despite intervention from specialist teams equipped with firefighting “Canadair” planes.
Wind movements, forest density, and demanding terrain have combined with the high temperatures and dry climate to make fighting this particular fire especially difficult.
Activists and experts are calling on people to be more careful in dense forest areas, emphasizing the significant losses such fires can have.
Experts say the high temperatures, reaching 45°C in some Moroccan regions, coupled with this year’s unprecedented droughts and reckless human behavior, like lighting campfires or throwing cigarette butts, have made Morocco’s forests particularly vulnerable this year.
National authorities such as the National Agency for Water and Forests had already enacted measures to combat the fires, such as ensuring that civil protection staff and equipment are always on standby.
Following a difficult fight with wildfires in Chefchaouen in the summer of last year, Morocco invigorated its fire readiness measures, strengthening its fleet of firefighting planes with Canadair “Super Scooper” planes.
The aircraft is capable of carrying more than 6,000 liters of water to the fire site, with an average fill time of only 11 seconds.
The threat of wildfires continues to grow internationally, as climate change leads to higher temperatures and droughts, prompting many countries to strengthen their fleets and remain on alert during the summer seasons.
