Sicily State of Emergency?

It’s in all Italian newspapers.
But wildfires in summer in Sicily are as unheard of as wildfires in California.
It’s the Italian region that has the most every summer and this year there are exceptionally high temperatures throughout Italy.
There were 50 wildfires throughout Sicily yesterday, and they are not limited to Sicily. Many regions are affected.
If you go next month hopefully the weather will have a chance to help, who knows?

Sicily has declared a 6 month state of emergency because of the wildfires

and to obtain what you'd call Federal Funds. Sicilians' love affair with indipendence ends when it's time to get money from Rome.

We drove around in Sicily past week and passed by a decent fire that was probably 100 ft from the road. Driving all the way from Sicily to Rome, we saw probably 15 fires along the way, including one very near a rest stop (everybody seemed nonplussed). Supposedly a lot of the fires are set by warring neighbors or farmers illegally burning their fields.

Despite the excitement, haze, and intrigue - travel wasn't affected anywhere we saw. Given how hot it's been without rain, no wonder everything's burning.

Newman, thank you for your report from there. I was concerned about the arson, but i've been checking and it does seem like people are "nonplussed"!

We filled up gas with a fire in view and the wife was a bit nervous but the attendant could care less. Perhaps the 108f heat that day wore him out.

I don’t get the impression they burn crazy fast like can happen in Cali - there are no warnings not to go near, not even much of a response beyond the planes dropping water.

In Taormina one of the planes dropped down and refilled right outside a bay, was quite a sight.