Firefighters in France have contained the country's largest wildfire in decades, but authorities remain on high alert

Prime Minister François Bayrou described the nearly 40,000-acre fire, which has killed one person, as a “catastrophe on an unprecedented scale.”

The biggest wildfire in France for 75 years which devastated an area of southern France the size of Paris could “ reignite at any time ”, officials warned. The blaze, which killed a woman and injured 18 others, scorched through 39,537 acres of forest and villages after it erupted on Tuesday afternoon in the village of Ribaute in the Aude region.