No fires had broken out in the three areas, but residents were told to keep their mobile phones on and emergency bags packed. Even so, Spanish authorities began lifting evacuation and stay-at-home orders for thousands of people after firefighters made progress overnight. Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez has said it is “very likely” the largest civilian evacuation operation carried out in the country outside war. “We are at a point of fragility,” Eric Brocardi, spokesperson for France’s national firefighters federation, told the BFMTV broadcast network Tuesday. A fire making its own weatherAt its most violent, the Gironde blaze created a gargantuan black thundercloud, electrified and lit from within.