Firefighters have been tackling blazes in rural areas located south of the capital For more than a week [AFP]
At least six Chilean firefighters have been killed and four others injured while battling one of a series of wildfires which the country’s president said were intentionally lit by criminals.
The 10 firefighters, private contractors for forestry company Mininco, were trapped by a blaze raging in a mountainside forest in the Araucania region.
A helicopter succeeded in pulling the four injured to safety.
“The fire suddenly surrounded them because of the wind, they drew closer together, one against another, and saw the fire pass above them,” Miguel Mellado, a local governor, told Canal 13 television.
“It is most probable that the two survivors were those who were underneath,” Mellado said, speaking before Pinera raised the number of survivors to four.
High winds and an unusually hot and dry early summer have seen forest fires ravage large areas of central and southern Chile, burning down scores of homes and destroying about 50,000 hectares of woodland and brush.
Pinera, who pledged his government would do everything possible to find those responsible, evoked anti-terrorism
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