Search operations in Los Gallardos suspended after no further victims found in the areas affected by fire

Guardia Civil sources have indicated that the operations carried out throughout the morning in conjunction with members of the Andalusian Emergency Group (GREA) and the Military Emergency Unit (UME) came to an end at around two o’clock in the afternoon.

The thorough search, carried out on foot in areas previously identified as ‘hotspots’ but which could not be explored, was supported by dogs and drones, and focused in particular on ruined houses and ravines to ensure that no missing person was left unaccounted for.

In this regard, the president of the regional government of Andalucía, Juanma Moreno, expressed his confidence on Sunday morning that, following this work, no further victims of the disaster would be found; the incident has so far claimed the lives of 12 people who are yet to be identified following the extraction of their DNA profiles, which will need to be matched against those of potential relatives. As yet, eight formal reports of missing persons have been filed.

“The Guardia Civil is doing a great job with DNA analysis,” acknowledged Moreno, referring to the work carried out by the biology department of the forensic science service in Madrid, to which the samples obtained at the institute of legal medicine (IML) in Almeria were sent.

Moreno pointed out that these are “slow” procedures, particularly given the condition in which some of the bodies were found. At the same time, he noted that the five people currently in hospital – four of whom, aged between 48 and 61, were transferred to the severe burns unit at the Virgen del Rocío University Hospital in Seville – are in a “stable” condition, although their injuries remain “serious”.

This morning, Juanma Moreno announced, from the forward command post in Turre where he was stationed, that, officially the Infoca Plan had officially declared the violent forest fire that broke out in Almocáizar, in the municipality of Los Gallardos, on Thursday afternoon to be "stabilised2.

The head of the regional government confirmed that the fire has been completely "contained", which has made it possible to immediately downgrade the emergency to operational level 1 and authorise “the gradual return” of the approximately 1,000 people who had had to be evacuated from their homes for safety reasons.