The Firefighters have found the corpse of a man burned inside the perimeter of the fire that was declared this afternoon in Batea (Terra Alta), already extinguished. The victim is a 76-year-old farmer from the same town. He himself would have accidentally caused the fire while he was carrying out some agricultural burning on his farm. It was his wife who notified the emergency services with a phone call at 112.
The Mossos d’Esquadra, which have already opened an investigation into the case, have not found any signs of violence and are working on the hypothesis that he died accidentally when trying to control the flames or after suffering a sudden health problem.
In the tasks of extinction of the fire, which has been considered controlled this Thursday afternoon and which has affected a forest vegetation area of ​​just over one hectare, 24 land crews of the Fire Department have come to work, five of which aerial.
The marinated wind has caused the flames to quickly gain intensity, although the ground maintained some humidity as a result of the last rains. The high intensity of the flames has led to entorxeig -the transition from a surface fire to a crown fire only in a timely manner- and the creation of secondary sources at a short distance.
The fire has jumped tracks but the work with water lines, aerial discharges and technical fire maneuvers carried out by the Forest Action Group (GRAFO) of the Firefighters have allowed it to stabilize at two in the afternoon. A helitransported brigade of Aragonese firefighters has also participated in the extinction tasks. Around a quarter to eight at night the fire has been considered extinguished. The Forest Active Prevention Teams (EPAF) are expected to review the perimeter tomorrow to rule out hot spots.
Once the flame is out, the Rural Agents have accessed the hot zone to determine the causes of the fire, which probably originates from a cream on agricultural margins.