A wildfire that broke out on August 3 near Cerro Poques, inside the Historic Sanctuary of Machu Picchu, had burned a preliminary 1.5 hectares of primary forest by August 5, according to Peru’s Environment Ministry, Latin American Post reported.
The Inca citadel itself remained untouched. The sanctuary covers more than 32,000 hectares, meaning the affected area represents less than 0.005% of the protected zone, though officials noted the fire was burning both above and below ground, a pattern that can allow it to persist in roots and re-emerge after a sector is thought to be under control.
A 29-person civilian force, including 15 park rangers, eight municipal workers and six employees of the company that transports visitors toward the citadel, fought the fire on slopes approaching 70%, before being reinforced by military personnel. The affected cloud forest is habitat for native species including the spectacled bear and the Andean cock-of-the-rock.
The fire forced Ferrocarril Trasandino to suspend train services through the affected stretch of track, with PeruRail cancelling three departures from Ollantaytambo and seven from Machu Picchu. Peru’s Ministry of Foreign Trade and Tourism said it was monitoring the situation and asked travellers for their understanding, according to a statement reported by EFE.
The disruption came during a period of high visitor volumes, with Machu Picchu receiving as many as 5,600 visitors a day since the high season began in June, up from an earlier daily limit of 4,600, an increase of around 22%.
The blaze is smaller than a fire that burned more than 800 hectares around the sanctuary in 1997, or one that burned an estimated 20 to 40 hectares nearby in 2022, which authorities attributed to agricultural burning. The cause of the current fire has not yet been established.