Fires in 30 cities of Sao Paulo, two people killed

(Patria) - The Brazilian state of Sao Paulo said that forest fires on Friday evening affected or approached thirty of its cities, adding that two people died in an industrial plant while trying to contain the flames, Reuters reported.

The cities have been hit by dry, hot weather in recent days, the government statement said.

The state government also warned that forest fires could spread quickly due to gusts of wind, potentially destroying large areas of natural vegetation.

The government has not yet reported that the flames directly reached the city of Sao Paulo, the largest by population in Latin America with more than eleven million people. However, local media report that smoke is blocking parts of the sky over the state capital.

The government said that two employees of an industrial plant in the city of Urupes died on Friday while fighting the fire, without providing further details.

Raizen, the world's largest sugarcane processor, said that industrial operations at a plant in Sertaozinho have been halted since Thursday due to fires in sugarcane fields around the plant.

The Sao Paulo government has created an emergency committee to deal with the fires, which have also blocked about fifteen highways, either fully or partially.

The fire season in Brazil typically peaks in August and September. This year, fires started unusually early in the Pantanal, the world's largest wetlands, at the end of May, while the number of fires in the Amazon rainforest rose to the highest in two decades in the month of July, government data showed earlier this month.