Firefighters on the Portuguese island of Madeira continued on Thursday to battle wildfires that have reached Funchal, the island’s largest city, killing three people and destroying over 150 homes, while the national government sought help to deal with nearly 200 blazes on the mainland.

Prime Minister António Costa planned to travel to Madeira on Thursday, and Portugal activated a European Union plan to get emergency assistance. Italy has already sent one firefighting aircraft. Madeira is the largest island in an archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean that lies about 360 miles off the Moroccan coast, and about 600 miles southwest of Lisbon.

The biggest fire on Madeira broke out on Monday and rapidly encroached on the residential outskirts of Funchal, home to about 110,000 people.

The fire caused chaos, panic and despair around Funchal. Portuguese television showed elderly people, many of them barefoot or in wheelchairs, being escorted to safety in the middle of the night by emergency services or neighbors. Residents watched in tears as their homes burned down, and some were seen running around helplessly, trying to cover their faces to minimize smoke inhalation.