Planes and helicopters joined more than a thousand firefighters in central Portugal Sunday to battle huge wildfires in a mountainous region where over 100 people died in huge blazes in 2017.
By 9:30 am (0830 GMT), one of the biggest mobilisations ever seen in the area -- including 1,100 firefighters and 340 vehicles -- had been deployed to fight the blazes in the heavily forested Castelo Branco region, 200 kilometres north of Lisbon, the rescue services said.
The biggest effort -- 760 firefighters, 230 vehicles and 11 planes and helicopters -- battled to douse flames in the municipality of Vila de Rei, which had spread nearly 25 kilometres. One seriously injured civilian was evacuated by helicopter to Lisbon, the commander of the Civil Protection for the region, Luis Belo Costa, told a news conference.