At the press conference that followed the meeting of the Council of Ministers held in Lisbon, the Minister of the Presidency, Mariana Vieira da Silva, also announced that the survey of damages caused by this fire will be carried out within 15 days, in a process that will extend to other municipalities in the country where “more than 4,500 hectares or 10% of their area” have burned in 2022.

The Institute for the Conservation of Nature and Forests (ICNF) considered the biggest fire in Serra da Estrela as the most extensive so far recorded since the one in Pedrógão Grande, in 2017.

The fire started on August 6th in Garrocho (Covilhã) and lasted 11 days in Estrela, extending to the municipalities of Manteigas, Gouveia, Guarda, Celorico da Beira and Belmonte.

In a press release sent to Lusa, the ICNF indicated that the Serra da Estrela region has been affected, since July, by a set of five large rural fires that reached a total of 28,112 hectares, of which 22,065 belong to the PNSE.

The declaration of a disaster situation corresponds to the most serious level of response to a disaster or catastrophe situation foreseen by the Civil Protection Basic Law.

Following the 2017 Pedrógão Grande fires, the Government also launched a Revitalisation Program for the Pinhal Interior.