{"id":116883,"date":"2026-08-16T10:25:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-16T10:25:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/116883\/"},"modified":"2026-08-16T10:25:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-16T10:25:10","slug":"belgium-battles-worst-wildfire-on-record-eu-allies-come-to-aid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/116883\/","title":{"rendered":"Belgium battles worst wildfire on record, EU allies come to aid"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Firefighters battling Belgium\u2019s largest modern-day wildfire were counting on crucial air support on Sunday to help tame the blaze in a hard-to-access nature reserve, after it doubled in size over the previous 24 hours.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">More than 250 firefighters and emergency personnel were mobilised through the night, according to a Sunday morning update from the regional government which warned conditions in the High Fens park near the German border \u201cremain challenging\u201d.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">From 80 hectares burned on Friday, the day the fire broke out for reasons still unknown, the area affected jumped to 850 Saturday morning \u2013 and by early Sunday had spread to 3,000 hectares (7,500 acres), authorities said.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The blaze broke out in an area of fragile peatlands and pine forests that was ravaged by massive wildfires in 1911, during a similar period of heatwaves and drought \u2013 and is the country\u2019s largest wildfire since then.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The entire area near the German border has been blanketed by a thick plume of yellowish smoke, prompting the evacuation of residents from parts of two villages close to the fire.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"A protester holds a placard in front of the Brazilian Embassy during a demonstration organised by Extinction Rebellion activists in Brussels in 2019, calling on Brazil to act to protect the Amazon rainforest from deforestation and fire. Photo: AFP\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1gf69pb2 css-6ikqhs e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/6275470c-bffc-4601-bb20-2a4c4462f368_1126e908.jpg\" title=\"A protester holds a placard in front of the Brazilian Embassy during a demonstration organised by Extinction Rebellion activists in Brussels in 2019, calling on Brazil to act to protect the Amazon rainforest from deforestation and fire. Photo: AFP\"\/>A protester holds a placard in front of the Brazilian Embassy during a demonstration organised by Extinction Rebellion activists in Brussels in 2019, calling on Brazil to act to protect the Amazon rainforest from deforestation and fire. Photo: AFP<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">No homes have been damaged so far, but the blaze remains out of control.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Firefighters battling Belgium\u2019s largest modern-day wildfire were counting on crucial air support on Sunday to help tame the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":116884,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[2872,1485,560,39,58616,40,92,58615,119,13927,17303,2075],"class_list":["post-116883","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-eu","tag-bart-de-wever","tag-belgium","tag-czech-republic","tag-eu","tag-european-commissioner-hadja-lahbib","tag-european-union","tag-germany","tag-high-fens","tag-norway","tag-sunday","tag-swedish","tag-wildfire"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=116883"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116883\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/116884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=116883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=116883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=116883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}