A forest fire raging in a national park in Spain's northwestern Galicia region has consumed more than 500 hectares of protected land, authorities said Sunday.

In the neighbouring region of Asturias, 28 separate blazes were still burning, officials added.

"The fire in the region of Capela (in Galicia), which has already affected, according to the latest estimates, an area of 500 hectares, is still active," the regional government said in a statement Sunday.

The fire, which began on Saturday in the early afternoon, quickly spread to the Fragas do Eume national park, an ecologically diverse protected zone, and forced some 200 people to evacuate.

Twenty firefighter brigades, including helicopters and four planes, have been dispatched to the area to try to contain the blaze.

Two other fires are still active in the same region.

Spain has seen its driest winter since the 1940s and by the end of February had already recorded more than 3,000 forest fires since the start of the year.