The Fire in Catalonia Sets Up the Alert in Europe

EFE / Fraga (Huesca) / date 11/9/2014 00:40h

The Goverment Confirms Having Lost Contact with La Generalitat

REUTERS

The Fire Spreads Through Catalan Territory, Completely Out of Control

The fire that broke out last night in Barcelona, ​​quickly spreading throughout the whole autonomous community in a matter of hours, has become the worst disaster of its kind in history, exceeding by far other major historical fires like 1906 San Francisco’s, 1871 Chicago’s in and 1666 London’s. The Catalan fire, which has reached enormous proportions and completely isolated population, threatens to affect areas outside the principality.

Such is the magnitude of the disaster that only images of the fire from the ground have been captures, always at a safe distance from the flames. Air traffic has been closed after two seaplanes and five rescue helicopters were lost at about a quarter to one in the morning. The gravity of the situation can be guessed when considering that all communication between the principality and the rest of the peninsula was stopped at approximately 00:30 pm tonight, just thirty minutes after the first major focus began in Barcelona. These data were calculated based on the activity of the social network Twitter, which contemplated the sudden appearance of trending topics related to the fire from midnight on, but stopped receiving tweets from Catalan users after 00:29 .

“We know nothing about what is happening there” the defense minister stated in an emergency press conference convened in Madrid at 2:15 am. “Our attempts to contact any member of the Government have been in vain” Apparently, the phone lines throughout the area have also stopped working.

International reaction has been immediate, with rescue teams sent by the European Defence Agency just an hour from the first alarms. Unfortunately, all attempts to smother the fire have been unsuccessful. As Catherine Ashton said just two horas ago, the huge cloud of smoke rising over the fire turns any attempt to approach the area into a suicidal act.

The fire comes at a key point in the political negotiations between the central government rule and Catalan representatives, as today was the chosen day for a controversial self-determination referendum to be held in Catalonia. Even though there were continued negatives from the Government of Rajoy, insisting on the illegality of the referendum, yesterday’s evening last words from Artur Mas, president of La Generalitat, had promised further disagreements between the two sides. Needless to say, these negotiations have broken down in an abrupt manner after the news.