British hikers found badly burned in Spanish wildfire

Two British hikers have been found alive but badly burned by rescue teams searching an area of southern Spain devastated by wildfires.

Two British hikers have been found alive but badly burned by rescue teams searching an area of southern Spain devastated by wildfires. The man and woman, who have not been identified, were found in a ravine in the hills of Los Gallardos, Almeria, and are thought to have suffered 40 per cent burns, according to Spain's national broadcaster RTVE. Guardia Civil officers said they had already checked the area, but had a feeling they should go back just as night was falling.

Sgt Pedro Barre told RTVE: "That experience we accumulate over the years is what tells you: take another look, give it one last try, check again just in case." As the team called out and used whistles, they heard a sound they thought at first was an echo, before realising it was human cries. Rafael Zea, another team member, said it must have been a "titanic effort" for the badly injured and semi-conscious hikers to raise their voices enough to be heard.

With the help of firefighters and emergency services, the pair were rescued after more than two hours. At least 12 people are believed to have died in the fire near the village of Bédar, and at least four are thought to be British because their bodies were found in a burnt-out right-hand-drive car. Spanish authorities believe all the victims were foreign tourists, who are thought to have attempted to escape the fire on foot after apparently abandoning their vehicles and trying to flee through rugged terrain.

For friends and family members of those missing, the wait for information continued on Sunday as DNA samples from the 12 corpses and relatives were sent to a laboratory in Madrid to confirm identities. Meanwhile, around 1,000 residents of Bédar were preparing to return to their homes in the hope of finding possessions and pets safe from the ravages of the fires. A total of more than 1,400 people evacuated from hillside villages because of the fire were expected to be able to return by the end of Sunday.

But for some of the residents, including hundreds of British residents, there was still anxiety as the Guardia Civil kept the access road closed until 4pm. "They just have not kept up well informed throughout these three days; there is no information centre," said Kamran Kamroonian, a retired technologist from Ashton-in-Makerfield, who shares a house outside Bédar with his wife Ann. Mr Kamroonian said they had not slept in the Red Cross-run shelters but stayed in their car with five cats.

"There are two more and we don't know what has happened to them or whether the house is still there," he said. "The police knocked on our door at 4am on Friday and said we had less than five minutes to leave or they would drag us out." Anger over missing phone alert Mr Kamroonian said they saw the wildfire come within 200 metres of their home, and said he was angry that Andalusia's government had not used the ES-Alert mobile messaging technology to warn residents in the area and save lives.

The regional authority has said it decided against such a large-scale phone alert as it would have reached the phones of people in multiple localities. "That's not an argument – just say in the message that this is information only for residents of Bédar. If this was not an emergency, then I don't know when you would use it," Mr Kamroonian said.

Other locals had words of praise for the emergency services and what they described as an efficient evacuation operation. "I heard the police loudspeaker and everyone left calmly," said a British resident of La Alameda, who did not wish to give his name. "They have done a fabulous job in fighting this fire."