Madrid tests so far show three Almeria wildfire victims were British

Almeria fire

Six victims have been identified this Monday thanks to biological samples from relatives of those missing

Gerard Couzens

Three of the first six Almeria wildfire victims identified following tests in Madrid are British, officials said this Monday afternoon.

The biological samples of the 12 people killed on Thursday were taken to the Spanish capital the following day so work on formally identifying them could begin.

This Monday the High Court of Andalucía confirmed four of the 13 people in total who lost their lives in the wildfire were British: “The first six identifications of the victims of the Los Gallardos fire have now been completed.

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“They are three men and three women, five of whom are foreign nationals and one Spanish.

“The Civil and Investigative Division of the Court of First Instance Number Three in Vera which is responsible for authorising the removal of the bodies, has already confirmed the six identifications.

“They include a married couple in which the husband is Spanish and the wife is a citizen of the United Kingdom.

“A man and a woman from the United Kingdom have also been identified, as well as a woman from France and a man from Belgium. All of them are adults.

“The first notifications to the victims' families have already begun. The notifications are being delivered in person by uniformed members of the Guardia Civil accompanied by a psychologist.

“The identification process for the remaining six bodies is now nearing completion thanks to the arrival of biological samples from the relatives of the deceased.

“The cooperation of the consular authorities of Belgium, the United Kingdom, and France is making it possible to obtain the genetic profiles, so all of the victims could be identified within a short period of time.

“The Biology Department of the Guardia Civil's Criminalistics Service has already obtained the genetic profiles of the twelve people who died in the Los Gallardos fire.

“The only primary identification method that has been possible to use to identify the victims of the Los Gallardos fire is genetic analysis.”

Late on Sunday officials confirmed a 93-year-old British woman injured in the wildfire had died in hospital in Almeria.