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WILDFIRE

IN IMAGES: How the worst wildfire in 40 years is engulfing Spain’s Tenerife

Tenerife is still struggling to control the "most complex wildfire" the archipelago has seen in four decades, with thousands forced to flee their homes and the island's pristine forests being engulfed by flames.

Published: 18 August 2023 10:31 CEST
IN IMAGES: How the worst wildfire in 40 years is engulfing Spain's Tenerife
A cloud of smoke billows over the village of Candelaria on August 17th 2023, from a huge wildfire which broke out two days earlier and is raging in the northeastern part of the Canary island of Tenerife. (Photo by DESIREE MARTIN / AFP)

It’s been two and half days since a wildfire broke out on the Canary island of Tenerife, just as celebrations for the island’s patron saint La Virgen de Candelaria were underway. 

This involves a pilgrimage by thousands of devotees to the coastal town of Candelaria, and it was precisely in the upper part of this municipality and in neighbouring Arafo where the blaze began late on Tuesday night.

Columns of smoke billow out of the forests surrounding the municipality of Güímar. (Photo by DESIREE MARTIN / AFP)
 

As of Friday August 18th, 3,200 hectares of land have been affected by the flames, mostly a steep, rural area which leads to Tenerife’s Corona Forestal, a natural park made up of densely forested ravines that surround the island’s majestic Teide dormant volcano, Spain’s highest peak. 

On Thursday, the fire spread north towards the municipalities of Santa Úrsula, La Victoria de Acentejo, El Rosario, La Orotava, El Sauzal and Tacoronte, leading authorities to evacuate more than 3,000 people and urge nearly 4,000 others to stay indoors. 

LATEST: Thousands forced to flee huge wildfire in Spain’s Tenerife

A group of pets evacuated from their homes along with their owners are received, registered, and cared for by members of different associations in the town of La Orotava. (Photo by DESIREE MARTIN / AFP)
 

In the island’s capital Santa Cruz and in the second main city of La Laguna, some 20 kilometres away from the blaze, ash and pieces of charred tree bark fell from the air while an orange sun hidden behind a huge cloud of smoke gave the sky an apocalyptic look. 

A helicopter flies through the apocalyptic sky over Tenerife as the ‘most complex fire in 40 years’ in the Canaries rages on. (Photo by DESIREE MARTIN / AFP)
 

Tinerfeños, as people from Tenerife are called, have heard the sound of hydroplanes’ engines rumbling back and forth for the past two days, a contentious subject among locals as there are none of these aircraft on the island and firefighters have had to wait for them to be deployed from mainland Spain, delaying the response to the wildfire. 

Environmentalists have referred to the blaze affecting the Canary Island’s biggest natural park as a “catastrophe”.

Satellite image shows the huge cloud of smoke from the fire in Tenerife reaching neighbouring Gran Canaria. Photo: Nasa
 

“The Corona Forestal forms a protective ring around the Teide National Park, it has a multitude of ecosystems connected to each other which have great biological wealth,” Jaime Coello told local Tenerife daily El Día.

Two people in El Rosario in northeast Tenerife look at the huge clouds of smoke as the flames approach the village. (Photo by DESIREE MARTIN / AFP)
 

“It’s vital for water collection and is the habitat of a multitude of species, some endemic to Tenerife or the Canary Islands such as the Canary pine tree, the blue chaffinch or the woodpecker.”

More than 250 firefighters have so far been drafted to tackle the fire, and troops from the Military Emergency Unit (UME) who regularly help efforts to stamp out some of the most dangerous blazes have also been mobilised. 

Nasa map showing the area affected by the wildfire on the morning of Friday August 18th.
 

“This is probably the most complex fire we’ve ever had in the Canary Islands in at least the past 40 years,” Fernando Clavijo, regional head of the archipelago, told reporters.

“The extreme heat and weather conditions… is making the work harder,” he added.

“We are facing a fire the likes of which we’ve never seen before in the Canary Islands,” meteorologist Vicky Palma, pointing to the vast column of smoke from a fire which by Friday morning had been spreading for 54 hours.

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TOURISM

Tenerife to start charging tourists to access natural parks

Amid environmental and housing pressures, authorities in Tenerife will soon begin charging tourists a so-called 'ecotax' to access natural parks, starting with the protected Masca ravine area.

Published: 30 May 2024 09:55 CEST
Tenerife to start charging tourists to access natural parks

The President of Tenerife’s Cabildo government, Rosa Dávila, announced on Wednesday that the first pilot scheme in the so-called ‘ecotax’ on the island will begin this summer for visitors to the Masca ravine area.

The idea is to charge tourists, defined as non-resident, for access to natural and protected areas. The small fee, the amount of which is still yet to be decided, will be accompanied by improvements to environmental security and bolstered local infrastructure in the area.

The Masca ravine, in the Teno rural park, will also reopen its jetty, which has been closed since 2018. Masca is one of Tenerife’s oldest and most breathtaking hiking routes, culminating in the Los Gigantes cliffs on the coast.

At a press conference, Dávila indicated that a three-way agreement will be signed between Buenavista council, the municipality to which Masca belongs, Puertos de Tenerife, and the Cabildo.

READ ALSO: Mass protests in Spain’s Canary Islands decry overtourism

In theory, a daily limit of 275 visitors will be implemented (Spanish media report that the annual capacity is estimated to be around 100,000) but tourists and non-residents will not be forced to take any particular route or itinerary and can travel freely to the area themselves or through tourist companies. However, bus services will be used to better regulate access to the site.

Dávila also suggested that the publicly-owned company Tragsa will handle the tourist charge, pending a decision on a wider ‘ecotax’ entrance fees for other natural areas across the Canary Islands. Fees for other natural areas of the island are set to be charged from January 1st 2025.

With regards to the cost, Dávila pointed out that “we are working on the analysis of the economic impact” and added that “we had anticipated that the Cabildo would cover the cost for residents of Tenerife”, which confirms that any entrance fee or ‘ecotax’ will only be levied on tourists and non-residents and that locals won’t have to pay it.

This comes amid bubbling anti-tourist sentiment in Tenerife and the Canary Islands. Concerns about the over-touristification of the islands, which causes environmental and housing pressures, has led to several protests in recent months.

READ ALSO: ‘The island can’t take it anymore’ – Why Tenerife is rejecting mass tourism

A proliferation of short-term tourist rental properties, particularly in the post-pandemic period, has priced many locals out of their own areas.

The ecotax, however, is not a flat tourist tax in the traditional sense, and right-wing parties on the islands previously rejected the idea of a tourist tax.

Catalonia and the Balearic Islands both charge holidaymakers tourist taxes, often tacked onto hotel bills. Spain’s Valencia region was also planning to until the right-wing government now in power revoked the law early in 2024.

However, measures approved by the Canary Parliament in April were to charge an entrance fee to visit Tenerife’s key sites and natural spaces, like at Masca, as well as not giving up any more land to hotels and other tourist complexes.

This comes after tens of thousands of protesters took the streets of all eight Canary Islands and European cities such as London, Berlin and Madrid in April under the slogan “The Canary Islands have a limit”.

READ ALSO: Why does hatred of tourists in Spain appear to be on the rise?

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