The wildfires blazing across Europe have been fuelled by extreme weather that has been made up to 20 times more likely than it would be without human-induced climate change, according to an analysis by World Weather Attribution.
Back-to-back heatwaves and an early drought have created tinderbox conditions in western Europe since early July, with severe wildfires burning across France and Spain in particular. Three people have died, thousands of homes have been destroyed and more than 300,000 people have been evacuated from hotspots in the two countries.
Emergency crew across Europe, the world's fastest warming continent, have faced barely a pause between fire fronts this summer.
Some of the wildfires were so large that they created their own weather system, making it even more difficult for fire services to contain the flames.
Analysis by WWA, an international scientific collaboration including researchers from Imperial College London, the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre and the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute, found that in today’s climate, events of this intensity are expected to occur once every six years in central Spain and once every 20 years in south-west France.
They said climate change intensified the heatwaves and drought, making the “fire weather” twice as likely in France and at least 20 times more likely in Spain.
France endured the hottest June since records began, with the heatwave exceeding the previous high in August 2003. Such high temperatures were found to have been ten to hundreds of times more likely to occur in 2026 than they would have been in 2003.
The analysis projected that fire weather will become more frequent, intense and widespread with increasing global warming.
Weather whiplash
Researchers found the wildfires demonstrate how the expansion of towns has increased the impact of fires, especially during tourist season. Changing land use, including extensive flammable pine plantations in France and increasing forest density in Spain, also highlight the growing challenge of managing wildfire risk.
Unusually wet springs, which encouraged vegetation growth that was then dried out by hot summers – dubbed “weather whiplash” – increased the risk of the fires that have generated exceptionally high carbon emissions and widespread smoke pollution, the analysis found.
The most affected areas gained five extra days of extreme fire weather per decade since the 1950s, while fire season has extended, meaning multiple regions are hit at once.
It also said that severe fire weather was no longer rare, meaning reducing wildfire risk would require effective suppression and cross-border co-ordination, and greater emphasis on prevention through risk-sensitive landscape planning such as increasing species diversity.
The role of climate change in the fire-weather conditions was analysed using historical weather observations. A metric called the Daily Severity Rating incorporates hot, dry and windy conditions, and reflects how difficult a fire is to suppress once it gets going.
Fiery extremes
Andreia Ribeiro, climate scientist at the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research in Germany, said: “When wildfires break out simultaneously across different regions, it becomes clear that human-induced climate change is not only increasing the likelihood of more extreme fires, but also their synchronicity. And that comes with a real cost, as overlapping fire extremes makes it harder for countries to co-operate and share firefighting resources with each other when that support is needed most.”
Clair Barnes, research associate in extreme weather and climate change at the Centre for Environmental Policy, Imperial College London, said: “What we’re seeing in France and Spain isn’t just bad luck; it is a clear sign of the escalating impact of anthropogenic warming.
“A wet winter, followed by this intensely dry summer and a succession of heatwaves, has left forests loaded with dry fuel. And relentless heat – fuelled by human-caused climate change – has created the conditions for sparks to take hold and become massive, dangerous wildfires.
“We’ve seen repeatedly how climate change increases hot, dry, flammable conditions that are extremely conducive to wildfires,” Ms Barnes added. “What’s unique about this case is that it’s still early in the season – and with another heatwave looming, these findings are extremely scary.”
Friederike Otto, professor of climate science at the Centre for Environmental Policy at Imperial, said studies “time and again show how Europe’s climate is shifting faster than governments are adapting”.
Difficult days ahead
Wildfire damage across EU countries has already exceeded the same point in 2025, a record year, with much of southern Europe on alert for wildfires. France, Spain and Greece were battling major outbreaks on Thursday, while a fire in Suffolk in drought-stricken southern England, which forced the evacuation of holidaymakers, was sparked just a few kilometres from a nuclear plant.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez downgraded the emergency level for a major fire on the border between Madrid and Castilla y Leon, but warned the danger had not passed as at least 10 other blazes caused concern across the country.
In France, two people were arrested on suspicion of arson as crew contained a vast fire near Bordeaux, while fires in Greece killed three firefighters and forced tourists and residents to flee parts of Crete, some by boat.
“We have difficult days ahead of us,” Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said.
Thursday's temperatures showed Europe was the continent furthest from its historic norm, according to the Reuters Climate Monitor. The average high was forecast to be 25.3°C, 3.6°C above what was typical from 1961 to 1990.
The toll of extreme weather has extended well beyond the widespread devastation caused by fires. An estimated 9,800 people have died from heat-related causes in Germany so far this year, the country's public health Robert Koch Institute said on Thursday, adding to a growing body of evidence that heat is behind thousands of excess deaths recorded this year in Europe.
Meanwhile, nuclear plants along the Danube river in Hungary and Romania were forced to cut output this week, and could be completely shut down in the coming days due to record low water levels. In France, where nuclear power provides roughly two-thirds of the country's electricity, output has also had to be cut because rivers are unable to provide water for cooling.
