Alex Trelinski
OVER 150 residents evacuated from a small Alicante province town returned home on Thursday, almost 48 hours after the start of a forest fire.
The blaze was reported at around 3pm next to a treatment plant in Benasau in the north of the region.
It destroyed 314 hectares of land within a 14 kilometre perimeter.
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Properties were evacuated in Penaguila due to the proximity of the flames and home owners were put up in two reception centres.
Penaguila mayor, Salvador Catala said the fire could be classified as stabilised and is expected to be fully under control on Thursday afternoon.
“These have been painful days because we have had to be away from home,” said the mayor.
He added that the blaze had mainly affected an area of ravine but also some almond and olive tree crops.
“The landscape is all grey and terrible,” Catala added.
Soldiers from the Military Emergency Unit (UME) havenow withdrawn from the area leaving around a hundred firefighters.
Amancio Guerrero Romero from the Alicante Provincial firefighters said the main work was now putting out small pockets of smoke ‘little by little’.
He said there were concerns that a change in wind direction could create a small fire that would ‘complicate everything’.
He added nevertheless that the weather forecast is ‘good’.
