Wildfires raged across southern Europe on Monday, forcing thousands of people to evacuate their homes and prompting officials to ban spectators from a stage of the Tour de France cycling race.
Hundreds of firefighters are battling blazes that have devastated more than 190 square kilometres of land, an area more than twice the size of Manhattan, across Portugal, Spain, France and Greece.
And temperatures are on the rise again, predicted to reach 40C in parts of a region still suffering the aftermath of a recent record-breaking heatwave.
In southwestern France near the city of Perpignan, 700 hundred firefighters backed by special aircraft battled to control a "gigantic" blaze spreading in a hard-to-reach remote area, with more than 10,000 local residents evacuated.
Fanned by wind, intense heat and exceptionally dry air, the fire has nearly tripled in size since early Sunday, devouring 46 square kilometres and leaving a firefighter and a resident injured, local authorities said.
