Avelino and Begoña live in Lomo La Viuda, one of the last areas to be evicted on the very complicated day of Saturday, July 23, when the fire began to spread along the slopes of Tigaiga and threatened the populated area of Las Llanadas, in the upper midlands of The Realejos. Yesterday they tried to rest, as best they could, in a car with the trunk full of some of their belongings. “We have hardly been able to eat or sleep since the eviction, because of the nerves of seeing what was happening and not being able to return to our house,” explains Begoña.
“At four or five in the afternoon they told us that we had to leave the house and, in our haste, we caught almost nothing. Just a couple of changes. Two dogs stayed there and we wanted to go at least to feed them and give them water, “said Begoña. “See the animals, at least see how the animals are,” Avelino repeated. When asked how they experienced the moment of leaving their home, along with one of their 15-year-old sons and another older daughter who has a baby just nine months old, they only manage to answer with a “phew!”. They do not find words to express the anxiety generated by an order as blunt and transcendental as “you have to leave your house now.” His daughter and grandson went with another relative to Icod. They preferred to stay as close to home as possible.
«That hillside was very ugly and what we went through we will never forget in our lives. Seeing my daughter attacked with the child I do not forget, “says this resident of Las Llanadas. The teenager who accompanied them entertains himself with his cell phone, apparently oblivious to everything. When he is asked if he is scared or if he has had a bad time, he shrugs and smiles. Begoña and Avelin recall that it is “the first fire he sees” and predict that “he will remember and we will not forget this in life either.”
Avelino, 58, can’t hide his tiredness or worry. In the midst of so much tension, he did not even approach the Las Llanadas sports center to ask for accommodation. They ended up spending the night on the floor of a neighbor’s living room.
“My mattress was hard,” Begoña jokes, remembering that she tried to rest for a while on the cold cement. “We didn’t sleep a wink,” confesses Avelino, who in the sweltering heat he had tried to take a snooze in his car. They looked at the hillside and saw everything “much better”, perhaps that is why they did not understand that they were not yet allowed to return home.
The Municipality of Los Realejos relocated a dozen families to local hotels on Saturday and asked all the evicted to go register in the Las Llanadas pavilion, where there were Social Services and Red Cross personnel, before going to the homes of relatives or friends. Due to nerves, ignorance or a certain modesty, Begoña and Avelino did not go through the pavilion and added to the suffering of the eviction a night that they will not be able to forget. Looking with fear at the flames on the slope of Tigaiga and desperate to be able to return home. They acknowledge that they stayed near the access control to the evacuated area in case they were allowed to return. That order was not yet scheduled for yesterday, waiting for the fire to definitively stop its progress.
“Now I’m hungry and I don’t have a penny to eat anything,” assured Avelino, who despite the information provided by the authorities had not understood that he could go to the neighborhood pavilion to receive food and care. THE DAY He put them in contact with the mayor of Festivals and Youth, José David Cabrera, who was in the area, and immediately took care of taking them to the pavilion so they could get water, sandwiches, juices and yogurts. “How come they didn’t come yesterday? There was everything and we would have sent them to a hotel », he lamented. Sometimes, and no matter how well thought out the devices are, there are people who stay on the sidelines.
Avelino repeated that he earns “nothing more than 420 euros” and that he could not go to a hotel. He couldn’t believe that the Realejero City Council was offering it to him for free, as an extraordinary measure in the face of the extremely complicated situation that Las Llanadas has been experiencing since Saturday.
25 07 2022 21:15
Temperatures will rise tomorrow in Tenerife and the Government has declared the alert for Maximum Temperatures. This situation, together with the Forest Fire Risk alert, forces the prohibition to access the island’s mountains to be maintained.
07 25 2022 21:01
“The fire has been contained and the hectares burned amount to just over 2,800,” said Julio Pérez, Security Councilor
2022 07 25 20:59
The informative press conference on the fire begins
2022 07 25 20:06
The technical meeting to coordinate the tasks of extinguishing the forest fire begins, with the assistance of the president of the Cabildo de Tenerife, the Minister of Security of the Government of the Canary Islands, the sub-delegate of the Government in the Canary Islands, mayors and representatives of intervening services
25 07 2022 17:24
The head of Civil Protection of the Government of the Canary Islands has declared: “The fire is still spreading. However, we have been able to complete the evacuation on Saturday and some 500 people are now returning”
07 25 2022 16:56
The president of the Canary Islands, Ángel Víctor Torres, has warned that although the fire is in the stabilization phase, this does not imply that it cannot be reactivated. “That is why we have to walk today so that we can say as soon as possible that we are going to the next phase, which would be the control phase,” he said.
25 07 2022 15:32
The 60 to 70 inhabitants of some thirty houses in Los Carozos and Los Madroños will not be able to return to their homes yet.
25 07 2022 15:32
The mayor of Los Realejos, Adolfo González (PP), has announced that the return of the residents of Los 3 Pinos, Hoya Farrais, Cruz del Castaño, Hoya de Pablo, Lomo La Viuda and Arenitas, is authorized
25 07 2022 15:31
The return of evicted neighbors in La Orotava and Los Realejos is authorized, except in the areas of Los Carozos and Los Madroños
07 25 2022 13:52
07 25 2022 12:44
The Los Realejos fire has affected around 2,500 hectares of land in the municipalities of Los Realejos, La Guancha and San Juan de la Rambla from its beginning, on Thursday, July 21, until Monday, July 25. Its perimeter is 27 kilometers. The video is a recreation of the possible area devastated by the fire.
07 25 2022 09:55
Torres reports that the fire is still at level 2 but is perimeter.
25 07 2022 09:52
The President of the Government of the Canary Islands, Angel Victor Torresamong other institutional representatives appears to explain the evolution of the Tenerife fire.
07 24 2022 21:24
The firefighting teams and the technical teams are “relatively hopeful” with the situation of the fire, mainly due to the fact that the weather conditions have been allied, said the councilor Julio Pérez after the technical meeting to monitor the fire.
07 24 2022 21:19
“We are confident that the evolution of the fire will improve despite the change in weather forecasts,” said Martin.
07 24 2022 21:18
The president of the Cabildo de Tenerife, Pedro Martín, has indicated that “the fire has reached a certain level of containment today”, but added that since the next few hours will be crucial to attack the fire, “the recreational areas and the access to the mountains will continue to be prohibited at least until next Tuesday night”.
07 24 2022 21:15
“Today we have had very good weather in the Tigaiga area, but it is a very complicated area in its orography”, but tomorrow will be a difficult day due to the increase in temperatures. “We have Tigaiga caught with tweezers,” reported the Cabildo de Tenerife coach Pedro Martínez.