Residents evacuated due to Benahavís fire go home as situation is brought under control

Work continued in the area to bring the fire under control, although, as Infoca noted on its X account, “it is developing favourably as there are no active fronts allowing the fire to spread unchecked”. Specifically, 47 firefighters remained on the ground on Saturday morning, along with three fire engines and a medical unit.

The 257 residents (132 from Marbella Hills and 125 from Caserías del Esperonal) who were still evacuated due to the fire were returning to their homes in stages, and the precautionary lockdown affecting 370 people in the Montemayor residential estate was lifted, according to a statement issued by EMA 112. Early on Friday morning, residents of Flamingos (1,013), Parque Botánico (687) and Four Seasons (96) – a total of 1,796 people – were able to return to their homes.

Given how the fire was developing, the AP-7 remained closed until well into Thursday night, on the section between kilometres 1054 and 1070, to assist with the firefighting efforts, although it is now open to traffic, meaning there are no roads closed as a result of this incident.

Work to extinguish the fire on the ground had been ongoing since Friday morning, with 170 firefighters initially deployed, along with a total of 10 fire engines and a light helicopter. At midday on Friday, Infoca reported that the operation had been scaled back and now comprised 44 firefighters on the ground, three fire engines, a light helicopter and a medical unit.

The Benahavís sports centre had been set up to accommodate evacuated people in need of somewhere to stay, and the Red Cross provided around fifty beds, although only about 25 residents made use of this option, as most have found accommodation with relatives, friends or in local hotels.

The regional government’s representative in Malaga, Patricia Navarro, was monitoring developments in the emergency from the forward command post (PMA) set up by the Andalusian emergency group (GREA) at Llano de La Ermita.

As for the fire in Behanavís, she noted that in this incident “the response was faster than on other occasions as the base in Istán was already operational, which greatly facilitates firefighting efforts”.

Navarro confirmed that Thursday’s north-westerly onshore wind caused the flames to spread very quickly. “There have been around 2,000 evacuations," she said on Friday.

According to Navarro, by mid-morning on Friday a total of 297 forest firefighting resources had been deployed, of which 122 were from Infoca, 12 Infoca fire engines, plus aerial resources. She stated: “We have no active fire fronts, and both aerial and ground resources are focused on cooling the northern part of the fire perimeter, which currently poses the greatest danger.”

EMA 112 has handled nearly 300 calls relating to the fire in Benahavís; the first of these, at around 4.30pm on Thursday, reported a fire that had started on the side of the AP-7, at kilometre 1068, and had spread to a wooded area near the Montemayor housing estate.

The emergency coordination centre mobilised Infoca’s provincial operations centre (COP), the Andalusian Emergency Group, firefighters from the Malaga provincial consortium and the Marbella town council fire brigade, the Guardia Civil, the Local Police of Estepona and Benahavís, the National Police and their regional unit, the road maintenance department, the Red Cross, the health emergency centre (CES) 061 and the Civil Protection volunteer groups from Marbella and Estepona.

The regional minister for health and emergencies, Antonio Sanz, in his capacity as director of the Andalusian Forest Fire Emergency Plan (Plan Infoca), raised, at 5.30pm on Thursday, the plan to emergency phase, operational level 1, in response to the development of the forest fire that had initially been reported and localised in Estepona but was subsequently pinpointed in Benahavís.

The emergency phase, Operational Situation 1, refers to fires which, although they could be brought under control using the standard means and resources available to the Regional Government of Andalucía, trigger this response due to their scale and the resources required to extinguish them, or because measures need to be taken to protect the public.

The Andalusian Emergency Agency (EMA) urges the public to exercise extreme caution and follow the instructions of the emergency services, and in particular not to approach the area of the fire to avoid unnecessary risks.

Sanz appealed to people’s common sense, asking them to avoid going near the area affected by the fire, as the presence of onlookers could hinder the work of the emergency services.