People in 25 municipalities in Spain are facing evacuations triggered by a wildfire burning around 100 km (62 miles) northeast of the nation’s capital.

The La Mierla Fire ignited inside Sierra Norte Natural Park on Thursday and has since burned over 16,000 hectares (nearly 40,000 acres), according to the Servicio de Prevención y Extinción de Incendios Forestales, or INFOCAM.

Authorities have upgraded the fire’s danger level to “high danger” level 2, meaning regional and national emergency resources are responding. A level 3 fire is considered a “national emergency” when the government would assume full control of fire operations.

Regional President of Castile-La Mancha, Emiliano García-Page, praised the “enormous” work of crews in the Guadalajara province on Thursday. He also marked the 21st anniversary of the deaths of 11 people during the La Riba de Saelices Fire, which García-Page said marked a turning point for the country’s focus on wildfire preparedness and prevention.

“Castilla-La Mancha is the region that has made the most progress, investing the most in these 20 years in technical fire resources, personnel, professional resources, and also aerial resources,” García-Page said. “We have the highest levels of per capita spending, probably in Europe, in relation to prevention and also to the care of the countryside throughout the year.”

All of Spain is experiencing extreme or very high fire danger in July as over 70,000 hectares (173,000 acres) have burned in 2026, exacerbated by the widespread extreme heatwave and drought Europe faced starting in late May. Wildfires in the southern city of Almeria baked in 40C (104F) degree heat and caused the deaths of 13 people, becoming the deadliest wildfire in the Andalusia region’s history and the third deadliest in Spanish history.

Spain had its second-most destructive wildfire season in history in 2025, when over 350 fires burned more than 393,000 hectares (971,000 acres). The only other year that came close to that level of burned area was 1994, when an estimated 437,602 hectares (1.1 million acres) burned across the country.

Burned area and total fire numbers in Spain have been trending upward over the past decade. Recent research has determined that increasingly extreme temperatures driven by climate change will likely lengthen peak wildfire season in Spain by 4 to 6 weeks and make extreme fire weather conditions more common.

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