Deadly wild fires rage across Europe

DEADLY summer wild fires spread across Spain, France, Italy and Greece on Friday with holidaymakers rescued from beaches and thousands of firefighters brought into the battle.

At least seven people are known to have died in the fires over three days. A Spanish fireman and a shepherd and a farmer on the Italian island of Sardinia were the latest fatalities. Helicopters and civil protection boats plucked about 120 people to safety from a beach at Capo Pecora in the south-west of Sardinia on Thursday night after they became trapped by flames. Near Cagliari, the island’s main city, inmates from a prison spent the night on a beach because fire threatened the penitentiary.

Some 25,000 acres of forest and brush have been destroyed by six separate fires on Sardinia. Hundreds of firefighters backed by Canadair water planes tried to bring them under control yesterday.