The figure makes you dizzy: more than 200 forest fires ravage central Chile and sow death in their path.

“We mourn thirteen dead in total, eleven in the city of Santa Juana (Biobio region), a pilot of Bolivian nationality and a mechanic of Chilean nationality who crashed in a helicopter that was fighting the fires”, declared, Friday February 3, Mauricio Tapia, Deputy National Director of the National Disaster Prevention and Response Service (Senapred).

The aircraft crash occurred in the Galvarino sector, in the Araucania region. And among the other victims, some were traveling in vehicles. Chilean Interior Minister Carolina Toha said two people died while driving on a main road affected by the flames, while the other two died in a traffic accident, “while trying to probably to escape the fire”.

The Specter of 2017

The authorities have also identified twenty-two injured, eight of them in serious condition. Of the 204 active fires, 56 are out of control, despite the approximately 2,300 brigadiers mobilized. More than 40,000 hectares were devastated and 97 houses completely destroyed.

These fires occur during an extreme heat wave with temperatures close to 40°C, which makes authorities fear a disaster like that of 2017. That year, a gigantic forest fire killed eleven people, some 6,000 victims, destroyed more than 1,500 houses and ravaged 467,000 hectares of land.

As in the previous disaster, the fires started in agricultural regions and forests before spreading and threatening inhabited areas. Traffic on one of the main roads leading to the city of Concepcion, located 510 kilometers south of the capital Santiago, has been limited since Thursday due to the proximity of the fire. One of the epicenters of the tragedy is the town of Santa Juana, 52 kilometers south of Concepcion.

Two people arrested

According to a resident interviewed by Cooperativa radio, the fire began to threaten the houses around 7 a.m. “I only ask God for mercy. That’s all. What happens is in God’s hands,” he said.

The Chilean government has declared a state of disaster in the regions of Ñuble and Biobio (Center). Outbreaks also affect the regions of Maule and Araucanie (Centre).

President Gabriel Boric suspended his vacation to go to the city of Concepcion, in the region of Biobio, then in that of Ñuble, he said on Twitter.

Chile’s prosecutor’s office meanwhile announced that two people linked to the fires in the Biobio and Araucanía regions have been arrested.