{"id":322455,"date":"2026-01-18T21:18:05","date_gmt":"2026-01-18T13:18:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.namnewsnetwork.org\/?p=322455"},"modified":"2026-01-18T21:18:05","modified_gmt":"2026-01-18T13:18:05","slug":"chile-declares-emergency-after-wildfires-force-20000-to-evacuate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/?p=322455","title":{"rendered":"Chile declares emergency after wildfires force 20,000 to evacuate"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bssnews.net\/assets\/news_photos\/2026\/01\/18\/image-352317-1768740742.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"452\" height=\"253\"\/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>SANTIAGO, Jan 18 (NNN-AGENCIES) &#8212; Chilean President Gabriel Boric\u00a0declared a state of emergency on Sunday for two southern regions where raging\u00a0wildfires have forced about 20,000 people to evacuate their homes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Firefighters were battling 19 blazes across the country, 12 of which were in\u00a0the regions of Nuble and Biobio, south of the capital Santiago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;In the face of the ongoing serious fires, I have decided to declare a state\u00a0of natural disaster for the Nuble and Biobio regions,&#8221; the left-wing\u00a0president said in a post on X.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;All resources are available.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The government has not said whether the fires killed anyone or how many homes\u00a0had been impacted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Alicia Cebrian, the director of the National Service for Disaster Prevention\u00a0and Response, told local media that about 20,000 people had been evacuated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>She said most of the evacuations were in the Bibio cities of Penco and\u00a0Lirquen, which have a combined population of around 60,000 people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Images broadcast by local television showed the flames in both cities, with\u00a0charred cars in the streets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Wildfires have severely impacted south-central Chile in recent years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In February 2024, several fires broke out simultaneously near the city of\u00a0Vina del Mar, northwest of Santiago, resulting in 138 deaths, according to\u00a0the public prosecutor&#8217;s office.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>About 16,000 people were affected by those fires, authorities said. &#8212; NNN-AGENCIES<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>SANTIAGO, Jan 18 (NNN-AGENCIES) &#8212; Chilean President Gabriel Boric\u00a0declared a state of emergency on Sunday for two southern regions where raging\u00a0wildfires have forced about 20,000 people to evacuate their homes. Firefighters were battling 19 blazes across the country, 12 of which were in\u00a0the regions of Nuble and Biobio, south of the capital Santiago. &#8220;In the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":322456,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[208],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322455"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=322455"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322455\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":322457,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322455\/revisions\/322457"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/322456"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=322455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=322455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=322455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}