'The fire is horrific, flames are 10 to 15 metres high'

The Foreign Office last night said British citizens had been caught up in the evacuation and travel agents in Scotland said they were closely monitoring the situation. Millions of Britons visit the Costa del Sol every year and the area is also popular with expats.

Authorities believe the fire may have been started deliberately outside the mountainside town of Coin, north-east of Marbella, before spreading quickly west through dry countryside, fanned by strong winds.

More than 4000 people were evacuated to sports centres when the fire reached the edge of the city, which is full to capacity with summer tourists.

The Foreign Office confirmed about 300 British travellers had been among those moved to shelters, with hundreds more told to leave their homes and hotels.

A spokesman said: "We have deployed consular staff to visit evacuation centres and they are providing assistance to British residents who have had to leave their homes.

"We estimate several hundred Britons have been evacuated, including some 300 who have been relocated to evacuation centres in the La Cala de Mijas and Calahonda areas."

Two Britons are understood to have been treated in hospital for smoke inhalation.

Angel Nozal, the mayor of Mijas, a town between Marbella and Malaga, described the scale of the fire, saying: "The fire is horrific, the flames are 10 to 15 metres high."

As the flames continued to spread yesterday, the body of an elderly man was found in the town of Ojen from which all residents were evacuated as fire destroyed their valley. A 40-year-old mother and her two children had to hide in caves to escape the flames.

A man and a woman in their 50s were also being treated for burns and bruises. One of them was in a serious condition.

At the height of the crisis, around 300 firefighters were tackling the blaze as it reached the outskirts of Marbella.

Gordon Frew, 64, from Edinburgh, told how he watched the fire spread from the terrace of his apartment in Figuerola, around five miles from the seat of the blaze.

Mr Frew, who is retired and has lived on the Costa del Sol for around a year, said: "It started not too far from where we are, but it moved further west when the wind picked up. Instead of coming towards us, the blaze thankfully moved to the west.

"We could see the flames and the smoke in the distance and there are a lot of Brits in the area now affected. There have been helicopters and seaplanes used to disperse the water and the smell of woodsmoke was everywhere.

"It has been so dry here. Normally our wet times are October and February, but it didn't rain at all during those months."

Travel agents in Scotland have also been in touch with their staff in the area. A spokeswoman for Barrhead Travel said it had contacted its hotels in Marbella to establish that all of its clients were safe and it was monitoring the situation.

Thomas Cook also said it had been in touch with the authorities in Spain and all of its customers in the area had been given a 24-hour helpline to call.

A dry winter followed by a hot summer has left much of the region vulnerable to fires, with temperatures reaching record levels in some areas. Already this year, there have been nearly 12,000 wildfires.

However, Elias Bendodo, president of Malaga Council, said yesterday's fire was the worst they had ever seen.

"This is without a doubt the worst fire we've had in Malaga.

"Thousands of people have been evacuated ... Two people are definitely injured and ... lots of houses have suffered damage," he said.

Last night, many residents had been allowed to return to their homes and one of the roads that had been closed close to Marbella had been reopened.

Yesterday's crisis comes after thousands of people were evacuated earlier this month in the Canary Islands, while four people died in fires in the border area between France and Catalonia, in north-east Spain, in July.