Fires in La Gomera and La Palma

[Janet]

We had ours in Tenerife a week or so ago, but as of yesterday, fires are raging in La Gomera and La Palma. They think they might have the one in La Palma under control by tomorrow, but the one in La Gomera is now "absolutely out of control" ... and that's from the President of the Canaries.

The real tragedy is that it's not just "La Gomera", but the Garajonay forest, which isn't just a national park, but a world heritage site. This is tragic.

I am hopeless taking photos in the dark because I have a digicam and can't hold it still for long enough with the flash off ... but the first one clearly shows the smoke coming from the left hump of La Palma. The second one is much less clear because there's a lot of mist and low-lying cloud in the way, but the flames in the Garajonay forest on La Gomera are clearly visible ... all the way from the west coast of Tenerife.

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[Nova]

I hope the authorities respond more quickly this time 

[Janet]

bloody useless.

They're now saying the water planes, which were promised for 5.30 this afternoon will be in operation "tomorrow" ...

now that it's dark I can see flames really clearly from La Gomera but they won't photograph at such a distance.

[Myrtle Hogan-Lance]

We can see the forest fires in La Gomera with the naked eye, from the west coast of Tenerife.  The calima has backed off enough so that we can.  They look nasty, like ours did two weeks ago.  Not nice.

[Nova]

Oh no, it sounds pretty bad 

If it's ok with you I'm going to merge this thread with the one Janet already started 

[Janet]

Looks like they'll have the La Palma one under control by tomorrow, but the La Gomera one is an utter disaster. Houses burnt, it's reached the Garajonay, they're saying it'll burn for days ...

Seems the water planes did manage to dump at least one load before darkness fell, and they'll resume in the morning of course, but this just cannot be happening.

[Myrtle Hogan-Lance]

Before the clouds set in, we could see the smoke rising high over La Gomera, even coming through the clouds.  It looks big and bad.

[Janet]

This is a NASA satellite photo taken yesterday. The La Gomera fire is still spreading and they are saying it is so bad they won't be able to get it under control today.

In the picture it's easy also to see the brown swathe on Tenerife's west coast where our recent fire was. I don't want a bloody train. I want a water plane.

[Janet]

Both fires still out of control, Igualero evacuated ... and now 9% of the Garajonay is burnt ...

surely heads have to roll for this. Don't they? 

[Nova]

They should, but does that mean they will?  Why the hell weren't the lessons learned in Tenerife???