Europe sizzles on sixth day of deadly heat wave

PARIS/MADRID - Hundreds of firefighters brought wildfires under control in southern France on Saturday as Europe sweltered on the sixth day of a widespread, deadly heat wave that has fulled record-breaking temperatures, killing at least six people.

In the worst-hit Gard region, where France's highest-ever temperature was registered on Friday at 45.9 C, scores of overnight fires burned about 550 hectares of land and destroyed several houses and vehicles.

"We came very close to a disaster," Didier Lauga, prefect of the Gard, told reporters. "There are still firefighters in place in case fires break out again."