2014 Västmanland wildfire

2014 wildfire in central Sweden

This article needs to be updated. The reason given is: Need final assessment of what happened and damage caused, not just news reports from during the fire. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information. (April 2023)

|

You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in Swedish.  (August 2014) Click [show] for important translation instructions.

* View a machine-translated version of the Swedish article.
* Machine translation, like DeepL or Google Translate, is a useful starting point for translations, but translators must revise errors as necessary and confirm that the translation is accurate, rather than simply copy-pasting machine-translated text into the English Wikipedia.
* Do not translate text that appears unreliable or low-quality. If possible, verify the text with references provided in the foreign-language article.
* You must provide copyright attribution in the edit summary accompanying your translation by providing an interlanguage link to the source of your translation. A model attribution edit summary is `Content in this edit is translated from the existing Swedish Wikipedia article at [[:sv:Skogsbranden i Västmanland 2014]]; see its history for attribution.`
* You may also add the template `{{Translated|sv|Skogsbranden i Västmanland 2014}}` to the talk page.
* For more guidance, see Wikipedia:Translation.

|

2014 Västmanland wildfire

Date(s)| 31 July 2014 (2014-07-31)-11 August 2014 (2014-08-11)
Location| Västmanland, Sweden
Statistics
Burned area| 15,000 hectares (37,000 acres)
Impacts
Deaths|

* 1 civilian

Non-fatal injuries|

* 1 civilian
* 9 firefighters

Structures destroyed|

* 80 homes
* 79 outbuildings
* 1 commercial property

Ignition
Cause| Accidental
Map

NASA Earth Observatory photo. August 4, 2014.

The 2014 Västmanland wildfire was a wildfire that broke out on the afternoon of 31 July 2014 on the border between Sala Municipality and Surahammar Municipality in Västmanland, Sweden.[1] It is Sweden's largest wildfire in 40 years.[2] After an EU appeal, Italy and France provided firefighting aircraft.[3]

On 4 August 2014, the evacuation of residents began in Gammelby alongside Route 668 east of Lake Virsbo, Västervåla and Ängelsberg.[4] As of 5 August 2014[update], over one thousand people were forced to evacuate their homes, and the town of Norberg, with about 4500 residents, was being considered for evacuation. One person was confirmed killed by the fire near Stabäck. The fire was declared a national emergency. It encompassed over 15,000 hectares and was located northwest of Sala.[2] The Swedish Armed Forces were mobilized, with about 100 personnel providing support to the firefighters as of 7 August.[4] Authorities requested that volunteer firefighters stay away after one group of them became trapped and had to be rescued.[2]

The wildfire threatened the UNESCO World Heritage Site Engelsberg Ironworks. The owners of the Ironworks, Nordstjernan, rented two helicopters of their own to water the area close to the site.[5]

The Swedish police started a preliminary investigation of the cause of the fire, to see if it was caused by criminal negligence. According to local media, a driver of a ground-preparation vehicle stated that the fire started in his vehicle and that no fire watch was posted despite a very high risk of fire.[6] Although the 2014 Swedish heat wave did not cause the fire, the exceptionally hot and dry conditions of the summer of 2014 enabled the fire to spread and intensify.[7]

## See also

[edit]

* List of wildfires

## References

[edit]

1. ^ Engström, Julia (31 July 2014). "Skogsbrand på kalhygge". Sala Allehanda (in Swedish). Virsbo. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 4 August 2014.
2. ^ a b c Molin, Anna (5 August 2014). "One Dead as Sweden's Forest Fire Rages On / About 1,000 People Have Been Evacuated From Their Homes". The Wall Street Journal. Dow Jones & Company. Retrieved 6 August 2014.
3. ^ "Five day fires out of control". The Local. 5 August 2014. Retrieved 6 August 2014.
4. ^ a b "Skogsbranden" (in Swedish). Länsstyrelsen Västmanland. Archived from the original on 2014-08-12. Retrieved 6 August 2014.
5. ^ Schönstedt, Tommy (5 August 2014). "Världsarvet hotas nu av jättebranden". Expressen (in Swedish). Retrieved 29 March 2016.
6. ^ Segerstedt, Rolf (7 August 2014). "Polisen utreder eventuellt brott för skogsbranden" (in Swedish). Lantbruk.com. Archived from the original on 10 April 2016. Retrieved 29 March 2016.
7. ^ Molin, Anna (6 August 2014). "Europe News: Sweden Battles Against Deadly Wildfire". The Wall Street Journal. ProQuest 1551253951.

## External links

[edit]

* Media related to Wildfire in Västmanland 2014 at Wikimedia Commons

59°54′N 16°09′E﻿ / ﻿59.90°N 16.15°E﻿ / 59.90; 16.15

KML file (edit • help)

w:sv:Wikipedia:KML/Skogsbranden i Västmanland 2014

KML is from Wikidata