Locals on impact of Portugal wildfires

(18 Aug 2022)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Serra da Estrela natural park - 18 August 2022
1. Various of scorched landscape
2. Tilt up from dry river under Roman bridge to burned area in the background
3. Various of burned area
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Vale Formoso - 18 August 2022
4. Various of greenhouse burnt by fire
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Manteigas - 18 August 2022
5. Wide of city centre
6. Various of Serra da Estrela park local office
7. Landscape partially burned
8. Wide of hotel
9. Mid of hotel reception
10. Owner looking at landscape
11. Wide of burned area seen through window
12. SOUNDBITE (Portuguese) Luis Vinagre, restaurant and hotel owner in Manteigas:
"Since the first day of the wildfire many of the reservations were cancelled, in other cases people were on their way but they could not arrive here because roads were closed. At a later stage we contacted them to come but it was too late they were already back home. We have an economic impact of around 70 percent."
13. Cutaway of hotel flyers
14. SOUNDBITE (Portuguese) Luis Vinagre, restaurant and hotel owner in Manteigas:
"To the local economy this ( impact of wildfire) is a lot. We have two seasons in which we try to cash in for the whole year.  When these peak seasons don't come through – in this case was because of the fire but it could have been something else - our revenue goes down and there's no way around it, there are losses."
15. Close of brochure
16. SOUNDBITE (Portuguese) Luis Vinagre, restaurant and hotel owner in Manteigas:
(I feel) "Sadness. But at the same time we will fight because we can overcome this and there will be better days ahead, if God allows."  
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Covilhã - 18 August 2022
17. Various of firefighters monitoring area, resting
18. Various of burned area
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Manteigas / Serra da Estrela natural park - 18 August 2022
19. Various of tourists by the river, scorched areas
STORYLINE:
Authorities in Portugal said Thursday they had brought under control a wildfire that for almost two weeks raced through pine forests in the Serra da Estrela national park, but officials warned a dangerous new heat wave is about to arrive.
High temperatures, strong winds and a severe drought helped sustain the biggest blaze of the summer, with the area's deep ravines and steep hillsides making firefighting difficult.
  
More than 1,100 firefighters remained in the Serra da Estrela, keeping an eye out for hot spots and embers that might be blown into untouched forest, the Civil Protection Agency, a government department, said.
The blaze charred more than 26,000 hectares of woodland, according to European Union data -- about one-fourth of the park's area.
For the picturesque mountain villages and the small businesses that depend on visitors, the impact is severe.
A restaurant owner and hotel manager in the city of Manteigas, one of the main places in the mountain usually filled with tourists during peak season, said he had losses of  around 70 percent.
Several tourists cancelled their reservations, others could not arrive as roads were closed during the worst days of the wildfire and then it was too late to reconsider their holiday plans.  
On Wednesday, the fire's perimeter measured 160 kilometers, emergency officials said, and jumped 125-meter-wide firebreaks that had been cleared since the area's last major blaze, in 2017.
Fire officials said that was an indication the country is fighting a "new generation" of wildfires that are harder to stop amid the consequences of climate change.
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