Helicopters and airplanes dumped water on wildfires and the smoldering wreckage of hilltop neighborhoods today as sailors in riot gear prepared to evacuate 700 more families who would be endangered if the winds turn again.
Already 8,000 people were homeless as wildfires sent burning embers flying from hilltop to hilltop, destroying 2,000 homes in this picturesque coastal city. Smoke rose from smoldering ruins all over the city, a scene many compared to Dante's inferno.
After days without sleep, some people made their way home, only to discover complete ruins. The fires, so hot that they created their own fierce winds, consumed entire neighborhoods in some places. In others, a few houses emerged unscathed, but they too remained in danger with so many embers still glowing in the shifting winds.
Chile's forestry agency predicted today that the fires won't be fully extinguished for another 20 days.
Aid was flowing from all over Chile to Valparaiso, where evacuees crowded into eight shelters. Chile's President Michelle Bachelet met with her ministers to oversee the emergency response.
The fires began Saturday in a forested ravine and quickly consumed ramshackle housing on one of Valparaiso's 42 hills. Hot dry winds blowing out to sea then kicked up the embers, which hopped across neighborhoods on six densely populated hills, where people live in poorly constructed homes without municipal water connections, fire hydrants or streets wide enough for emergency vehicles.
Yesterday afternoon's winds kicked up the flames again, and by today morning, the helicopters were still flying without pause, dumping water on hotspots.
Schools were closed today in the city, since some were damaged and others were overflowing with evacuees.
Bachelet toured the shelters and canceled this week's trip to Argentina and Uruguay, warning that it "could be the worst fire in the city's history."
Valparaiso is an oceanside city of 250,000 people surrounded by hills that form a natural amphitheater. The compact downtown includes Chile's congress and its second-largest port, and the city owes its status as a UNESCO World Heritage Site to the colorful homes built on slopes so steep that many people commute using staircases and cable cars.
But what's beautiful on postcards can be dangerous for those who live there: Many people have built on land not fit for housing.
