{"id":72966,"date":"2026-08-15T12:55:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-15T12:55:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/72966\/"},"modified":"2026-08-15T12:55:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-15T12:55:11","slug":"german-wildfire-near-belgian-border-under-control-local-authorities-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/72966\/","title":{"rendered":"German Wildfire Near Belgian Border Under Control, Local Authorities Say"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>HUERTGENWALD, Germany, Aug 15 (Reuters) &#8211; \u2060A \u2060wildfire in western \u2060Germany that forced the evacuation \u200bof thousands of people on Friday has \u200cstabilised, local authorities said \u200con Saturday, although residents were \u2060still \u2060barred from returning home.<\/p>\n<p>More than 2,000 people were \u200bevacuated from the village of Gey, near the Belgian border, on Friday after \u200bthe fire came within 300 metres (1,000 ft) \u2060of the \u2060community.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We are satisfied \u2060with \u200bhow things are progressing. Specifically, this means that \u200bthe fire \u2060has not spread any further,&#8221; Peter Berndgen, fire service spokesperson for the district in Dueren, told reporters.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The situation \u2060has stabilised somewhat.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The evacuation order for Gey was \u2060likely to remain in place through Saturday, Berndgen said, adding that authorities would review the situation later in the day.<\/p>\n<p>Emergency services were also preparing for stronger northerly winds later on Saturday, the Dueren district said in \u2060a separate statement, adding it remained unclear how they might affect the fire.<\/p>\n<p>(Reporting by Andreas Kranz in Huertgenwald \u200band Christoph Steitz in Frankfurt. Editing \u200bby Mark Potter)<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 Thomson Reuters.<\/p>\n<p>Photos You Should See: August 2026<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/august-14-pyss-w01.jpg\" alt=\"Seen in a long exposure, flames consume a fencepost as the Bug Fire burns near Doyle in unincorporated Lassen County, Calif., on Thursday, Aug. 13, 2026. (AP Photo\/Noah Berger)\" class=\"Image__PictureImage-sc-412cjc-1 bBgODV Image-sc-412cjc-2 SlideshowEmbed__Picture-fkpjfn-0 kQDDcT bUlaJL\"\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HUERTGENWALD, Germany, Aug 15 (Reuters) &#8211; \u2060A \u2060wildfire in western \u2060Germany that forced the evacuation \u200bof thousands of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":72967,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[937,982,1442,151,722,5,8104,4416,46],"class_list":["post-72966","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-germany","tag-belgium","tag-collections-world","tag-environment","tag-europe","tag-european-union","tag-germany","tag-pollution","tag-reuters","tag-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72966","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72966"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72966\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72967"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72966"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72966"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72966"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}