Overview
- The wildfire that swept through the village of Bédar on Thursday tore through homes and has so far left at least 13 people dead with several bodies too badly burned to identify.
- A survivor, Malcolm Timbrell, says he escaped by sheltering in abandoned cars while his wife Annette Kilgore is missing and feared dead pending DNA confirmation from post-mortems.
- Police and family members have confirmed that expatriate couple Pete and Fran Gillam are among the recovered victims, and authorities have collected DNA samples to identify other burned remains.
- Civil Guard teams later found two badly burned British hikers alive and hospitalized with serious burns after rechecking areas that had previously been searched.
- Officials link the rapid spread to a heatwave with temperatures near 44°C, and the Foreign Office and local emergency services are assisting families while DNA work and further identifications continue.