elicopters dumped water over a burning forest in South Korea on Thursday as fire crews struggled to contain the country’s worst-ever wildfires, which have killed 26 people, forced at least 37,000 others to flee their homes and destroyed more than 300 structures.
Multiple wildfires fuelled by strong winds and dry weather have been raging across South Korea’s southeastern regions since last Friday.
The South Korean government has mobilised thousands of personnel, dozens of helicopters and other equipment to extinguish the blazes, but gusty winds are hampering their efforts.
Rain was expected later Thursday. But Korea Forest Service chief Lim Sang-seop said the amount less than 5 millimetres (0.2 inches) is forecast likely won’t help much in extinguishing the wildfires.
The fatalities include a pilot whose helicopter crashed during efforts to contain a fire Wednesday and four firefighters and other workers who died earlier after being trapped by fast-moving flames.
Authorities haven’t disclosed details of the civilian dead, except that they are mostly in their 60s or older who found it difficult to escape quickly or who even refused orders to evacuate.
They suspect human error caused several of the wildfires, including cases where people started fires while clearing overgrown grass from family tombs or with sparks during welding work.
Lee Han-kyung, deputy head of the government’s disaster response centre, told a meeting Thursday that the wildfires have again disclosed “the reality of climate crisis that we have yet experienced,” according to Yonhap news agency. Calls to his centre were unanswered.
Scientists say the warming atmosphere around the world is driving ever more extreme weather events, including wildfires, flooding, droughts, hurricanes and heat waves that are killing people and causing billions of dollars in damage every year.
The wildfires have burned 36,010 hectares (88,980 acres) of land, the disaster response centre said Thursday. Observers say that’s the worst figure of its kind in South Korea.
