Wildfires are raging in southwest France, destroying 16 homes, burning 6,000 hectares of farmland and forcing nearly 6,000 people to evacuate from an area hit by massive fires last month.

France, like the rest of Europe, is suffering from heat waves and drought that have sparked numerous forest fires across the continent over the past two months.

“The fire is raging and is currently spreading to the Landes region, and 500 firefighters have been mobilized,” local authorities in the Gironde region, where grapes are grown, were quoted by Reuters as saying in a statement.

In July, the Gironde region in southwestern France was hit by two massive fires that destroyed more than 20,000 hectares of forest and forced about 40,000 people to flee their homes. Fires also broke out yesterday in other regions of the country, one of them in the Lozère and Aveyron regions in southern France, where almost 600 hectares have already burned, and Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin is due to visit the two regions later today.

According to local authorities, another fire broke out in the Maine-et-Loire region in western France, destroying 650 hectares and threatening another 500 hectares.