A few days ago, Paco Castañares posted a video of the Las Nogaledas Gorge, in the heart of the Jerte Valley. His words serve to give you an idea of what was seen and, above all, what was not seen in it: “the most beautiful and emblematic waterfall, turned into a smelly flood of chapapote, ashes, burned plant remains and heavy metals.”
And no, it is not an isolated event.
Because, as they said from Forest Education“these rains have not been good at all.”
“How come they’re not good?”anyone with could tell me access to embalses.net. 2025 has been a good year for rainfall and, in fact, we have been above 2024 throughout this time. But that ‘advantage’ has not been enough. Right now, we are even a little worse (0.30% less) than last year.
As explains César Rodríguez Ballesterosthe water in recent weeks has fallen, especially in the western part of the country. And it is precisely there where our greatest capacity of dammed water is found. On paper, these rains are manna from heaven.
But there is a small problem. That 2025 has not been a normal year in terms of fires. 382,000 hectares have been burned. That is, 800% more in 2024. Or it is the same, more than the entire surface burned from 2018 to 2014 all together.
If we look in any forestry manual, we can see that rains (especially if they are intense) have two effects when they fall on land devastated by fire: the first is erosion (since there is no vegetation to retain it, the surface layer washes away and moves).
The second is water pollution. It is not only the toxic effects of ash and soot that are washed into rivers, lakes and reservoirs. We are talking about the increase in nutrients (nitrates, ammonia, phosphorus) with the risk of eutrophication, increased turbidity and damage to water channeling and treatment systems.
And the worst of all is that it could have been avoided. It is not easy, nor simple; It’s true. But there are measures of soil restoration, a barrier system to control erosion and plans to fine-tune water management systems.
None (or, at best, very little) of this has been executed.
And the result is problems, problems and more problems. We said it above: in these circumstances, the rains have become bad news. An enormous problem, in fact, that is going to put the water supply of the entire west of the country in trouble (and it’s not the first time it happens).
But, beyond that, it shows us a clear path: climate change made it 40 times more likely the risk of fires this summer on the Peninsula. And, that means that, even if there are no more, those that exist they become much more dangerous: in 2022 there were 493 fires; in 2023, 371; and this year it seems that we are going to stay below 300.
We have to get used to living with the consequences of some fires that we cannot stop. But above all, we have to prepare.
Image | ECMWF
In Xataka | A spectacular fire tornado, recorded live: how these very rare atmospheric phenomena can form
GIPHY App Key not set. Please check settings