French President Emmanuel Macron on Friday asked the army to mobilize to help contain the worst wildfire the country has ever seen after seeking European Union help, as a local official warned the blaze was heading towards Bordeaux.
Some 44,000 people fled the up-market Cap Ferret peninsula south of Bordeaux on the Atlantic coast, with the only road threatened by flames.
Boats moved hundreds of people away from the fires, while others drove off the peninsula, known for its millionaire residences. More than 50 houses there have been destroyed.
At least 141,000 people have been evacuated in southwestern France and 25,000 in the Madrid region, among them more than 1,200 elderly and disabled people, French and Spanish officials said.
Madrid and Paris have called in EU help as flames whipped up by strong winds and boosted by drought tore through tinder-dry forests.
