Hell On Earth - Funchal, Madeira Island, Portugal

Wow what's with all the fires that have been popping up lately? I guess im glad i've been having lots of rain around here for the last few days. Hope everyone makes it out of there safely

reply to post by Happy1


I can't say I side with the conspiracy theorists, when I look outside and all the grass is brown because it's been a hot and dry summer.

I guess "Wildfires spread across Portugal" would not have sufficed.

How large are the fires compared to other known wildfires? Does it even justify to make a huge deal about it as compared to the many fires that erupt in California or Mexico?

I'm not trying to downplay the event. I'm trying to get a feel for its scale without sensationalist reporters messing with my head.

Can we all just agree though, that unless it's winter and the house catches fire, it's probably not a miracle. Yes? No? Maybe so?

Hello again, things are more calm in Madeira now, but still not completely solved. A lot of destruction but no casualties reported. 3 suspects of starting this fire arrested.

A lot of big fires happen in Portugal every year. Most have criminal origins which is revolting

Main concearns are now focused in a very big fire going on in Tavira (The Algarve). There are more than 650 fireman fighting this fire. Affected area is more than 20000 hectares which is a lot for a small region such as the Algarve.

Here are some photos: www.tvi24.iol.pt...

I wonder if they will have any high rise steel structures catching on fire.

It will be interesting to see of they "collapse" into a pile of dust.

Portugal has a very, very, very negligent forest policy. We had a dictatorship, some decades ago. However, that same dictator had some pretty good ideas, regarding forest fires and its prevention.

Nowadays, everything is just left behind. No one cares about cleaning the undergrowth, having guards on the forests, using prisoners to clean those some undergrowth (I believe some countries use that policy), removing resin from pine trees, avoiding the invasion of the eucalyptus, which destroys our forests, etc. Instead, they just say "oh, it's Summer, and it's hot, so it's normal that we have these forest fires".

About the eucalyptus: Portugal has so many corrupt politicians, that there's a huge possibility that out Government approves a law, proposed by some paper factory companies, which allows the "liberalization" of the eucalyptus on our forests. This will basically allow our forests to be destroyed. This is no exaggeration at all.

About the fires on Madeira: well, the island suffers from the corrupt politicians' decision. Madeira's number 1 guy said the aerial support couldn't be applied on Madeira, since the terrain is very sinuous. The next day, the president of the professional firefighters association denied that, and said it would be possible, but the Madeira's president is not interested in avoiding problems like this. Actually, he doesn't give a damn about nature. 2 years ago, huge floods occurred on Madeira, because they had the brilliant idea of narrowing the river canals, and constructing stuff where they shouldn't have been constructed.

Needless to say that our forests are dying every year, and the politicians only care about the money from the huge companies. This is one of the subjects that that disgusts me the most, since you can pretty much see everything getting destroyed, and no one stopping this.

In Portugal, you have a huge cement company destroying a natural park, by having a huge factory there. And with the approval of our previous prime-minister, that was also a former environment minister.



What was green is now becoming dark and grey. Heartbreaking, to say the least.