An out-of-control wildfire in Spain’s Canary Islands that is throwing flames 160 feet into the air has forced emergency services to evacuate more than 9,000 people from Gran Canaria.

The blaze – described by the local fire department as “a monster” – was racing across parched woodlands into Tamadaba Natural Park, regarded as one of the jewels on Gran Canaria, a mountainous volcanic island in the Atlantic Ocean archipelago off north-west Africa.

Famous for its beaches and mountains, Gran Canaria and its capital, Las Palmas, are popular holiday destinations for Britons and others across Europe.

The blaze is in a rugged inland area.

Canary Islands President Angel Victor Torres said 1,100 firefighters were being deployed in shifts along with 16 water-dropping aircraft to battle the blaze that started on Saturday afternoon.

The local government said around 14,800 acres had been burned in just 48 hours. Villages were evacuated and two dozen roads were closed, it added.

Emergency workers faced huge flames and gusting winds that blew embers into the air, starting secondary blazes, local fire officials said.

Summer temperatures on Monday were expected to hit 36C (nearly 97F) and build to 38C (100F) later this week.

A helicopter operates over the Gran Canaria wildfire
A helicopter operates over the wildfire (Arturo Jimenez/AP)

The Spanish caretaker government’s farm minister, Luis Planas, told a news conference in Las Palmas that Madrid sent a “cutting-edge” drone to the island that can livestream images of the fire at night. One aircraft on Gran Canaria also coordinated aviation movements to prevent an accident in the busy skies, he said.

Mr Planas said the official response to the fire on Gran Canaria was one of the greatest firefighting deployments recently in all of Spain.

Gran Canaria is the third largest island in the Canary Islands archipelago, which is 93 miles west of Africa. It has a population of 850,000.