Balkan wildfires: man dies as heatwave nears 40C

Firefighters battled wildfires across the Balkans on Thursday, August 6, as a heatwave was expected to peak with temperatures reaching 40C in some areas.

In Serbia, a man died in a village about 80 kilometres east of Belgrade after he lost control of a fire he had lit near his home, Serbian police said. Luka Causic of the police said the death showed the need to respect fire bans and urged people to be cautious.

A large forest fire was out of control in the Ibar valley in central Serbia, where fire crews and water-bombing aircraft worked through rough terrain to protect nearby villages. Smoke from another wildfire in a nature reserve northeast of Belgrade could be seen from the capital.

In Albania, authorities had brought dozens of blazes under control after fires in the south forced a small number of evacuations. Extreme fire danger warnings were in place for most of the region.

Days of heat have worsened drought conditions affecting much of Europe. Several parts of the Danube have fallen to record lows, squeezing hydropower generation and oil imports via the river in Serbia. At the Bezdan monitoring station, where the Danube enters from Croatia and Hungary, the river continued to drop after reaching record lows last week.