Should Irish people cancel their holidays in France and Spain as parts of the country are engulfed by wildfires?
Amid persistent heatwaves caused by climate change, more than 250,000 have been evacuated due to wildfires.
70,000 have been forced to move in central Spain, while fires have displaced close to 200,000 people in France.
On Lunchtime Live, Eoghan Corry of Travel Extra said roughly 10,000 tourists will be impacted by the wildfire evacuations around the Bordeaux and French-Spanish border region.
“This morning, we have some evacuations around Cannes as well - a very big campsite there,” he said.
“The campsites that are most popular with the Irish people, Gironde would be quite popular.
“But the main volume of people go closer to the ferries; they go to Brittany and they go the Vendée - not affected at all.”
Dans ces heures où les flammes éprouvent durement notre pays, la France révèle ce qu’elle est : un peuple uni, qui se serre les coudes.
Merci à nos sapeurs-pompiers, à nos militaires, aux forces de sécurité civile, à nos gendarmes et policiers, ainsi qu’aux agriculteurs… pic.twitter.com/DFzPt8vSYM
— Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) July 25, 2026
For those thinking about cancelling their holiday, Mr Corry noted there is no “absolute right to cancel” if a problem occurs.
“The evacuations are really preemptive and you have a lot of smoke,” he said.
“If you have medical conditions; small children, elderly people or anyone with COPD, it’s important that if you pull out, that your claim goes through travel insurance.
“There won’t be any actual refund from the tour operator or the airline.
“Like all these things, travel insurance is case by case.”
Mr Corry added that he personally would not change his plans yet, noting that the authorities in France are “very good” at controlling wildfires.
Main image: A wildfire in France. Picture by: Alamy.com.
