Residents of three suburbs near Bordeaux have been allowed to return home after French authorities lifted evacuation orders, though they have been told to keep their phones on and be prepared to leave again at short notice.
The wildfire in the Gironde region has burned an area four times the size of Paris and forced some two hundred and twenty thousand people from their homes — what France's interior minister has called very likely the largest civilian evacuation in the country outside wartime.
The European Union has been holding regular briefings on the wildfire crisis across southern Europe.
Ross Cullen has more from Bordeaux.
IN: “The European Union...”
OUT: “...control these blazes.”
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http://www.fsnradionews.com/feeds/0729-0725cullen-wildfires3.mp3