TWO occupants of a van have been found dead in what remains of their vehicle as they attempted to escape the devastating wildfires sweeping Galicia in Spain's far north-west, whilst homes, schools and factories have been evacuated.
A third victim – a man in Carballeda de Avia (Ourense province) - was killed after becoming trapped by the blaze when he tried to put out flames threatening his farm animals, whilst two others from the town remain missing.
A fourth, in his 70s, was trying to put out a fire from a wall in village near Vigo when he fell, costing him his life.
The number of fires actively burning has multiplied sixfold in three days and currently sits at 75, of which 14 pose a serious danger to the population, and most of which are believed to be the work of arsonists.
At first, the province of Ourense was the main one affected, but the flames in that of Pontevedra have now spread, reaching the city of Vigo.
Residents in the outskirts have been urged to abandon their homes and head for the main urban hub, where hotel rooms have been set aside to house them until the danger passes.
Horrifying footage of the inferno in the area shows the flames have reached the O Castro neighbourhood in Vigo, right on the edge of the city centre and in a built-up area.
Meanwhile, on Vigo's Avenida de la Florida, in the heart of the metropolitan area, hundreds of residents have formed a human chain to pass buckets of water towards the flames.
The central Plaza de España is already on fire, and graphic video images show advertising billboards melting in the heat.
National rail board RENFE cancelled the sleeper train due to leave Vigo at 17.55 for Barcelona, and passengers had a two-and-a-half-hour wait before being taken to Zaragoza by coach instead.
Meanwhile, the inter-regional ALVIA train from Pontevedra to Madrid had to be diverted because of the flames, whilst trains due to arrive in Vigo have all been cancelled.
They are only travelling as far as the city of Ourense, where coaches are being thrown on for passengers to get to Vigo.
Nearly 9,900 acres are ablaze and the various infernos have been started in 146 different places.
So far, 350 firefighters are on the ground and 20 hydroplanes and helicopters working every hour of daylight, emptying water over the flames, although this just evaporates before it hits the fire.
The infernos have spread across the border to the east into the neighbouring region of Asturias, where at least 20 residents from the villages of La Viliella and Larón have been evacuated from their homes as a precaution.
And although the northern coastal Galicia province of A Coruña was unaffected at the beginning of the weekend, two have been reported since in the hamlet of Aro, part of the town of Negreira, and in Ártabra.
Vigo University has called off all lectures for tomorrow (Monday) as well as evacuating its halls of residence, and the regional government has published a list of schools which will not be opening.
A monastery in Oseira (Ourense) has been evacuated and the monks resident there rehoused, whilst in four villages in the province of Pontevedra, emergency services had to smash windows to get elderly inhabitants out of their houses when the evacuation order came.
Numerous roads have been blocked by smoke and fire or shut by emergency services for safety reasons, including parts of the A-52 motorway and the N-120 inter-provincial highway.
Drivers on the A-52 at over 200 kilometres away from Vigo were engulfed in smoke.
Two women, believed to be pensioners, perished as they tried to get away from the flames in Nigrán (Pontevedra province) in a van.
Their charred bodies were found in the burnt-out wreck of the vehicle on the road linking the villages of Chandebrito and Camos.
Emergency services say their van had been surrounded by a wall of flames, leaving them trapped on all sides.
As well as the suspected arson attacks, wildfires active in northern Portugal at present are actually jumping across the river Miño into Galicia for the first time in known history.
And with gale-force winds expected to hit Galicia in the early hours as Hurricane Ophelia spreads from the Azores to Scotland, the catastrophe could get even worse.
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