ATHENS: Greece battled wildfires that have ravaged homes and sparked evacuations for a second day on Sunday, with the help of Czech firefighters and Italian aircraft expected to arrive later.
Five fires were still raging Sunday morning in the Peloponnese area west of the capital, as well as on the islands of Evia, Kythera and Crete, with aircraft and helicopters resuming their work in several parts of the country at dawn.
“Today is expected to be a difficult day with a very high risk of fire, almost throughout the territory,” fire brigade spokesman Vassilis Vathrakogiannis said Sunday, though he added that the situation was improving.
Forecasters predicted the strong winds that have fanned the flames would die down on Sunday in most areas but warned that Kythera, a popular tourist island with 3,600 inhabitants, continued to face “worrying” windy conditions.
Evacuation messages were sent to people on the island, which lies off the south-eastern tip of the Peloponnese, early on Sunday as the fire raged unabated.
“Houses, beehives, olive trees have been burnt,” Giorgos Komninos, deputy mayor of Kythera, told state-run ERT News channel.
“A monastery is in direct danger right now,” he said, adding that half of the island had been burnt.
Dozens of firefighters supported by three helicopters and two aircraft were battling the Kythera blaze, which erupted Saturday morning and forced the evacuation of a popular tourist beach.
Greece had earlier requested help from EU allies and two Italian aircraft were expected Sunday, according to the fire brigade, with units from the Czech Republic already at work.
Eleven regions of Greece still face a very high fire risk, according to officials.
Firefighters are working in several areas of the Peloponnese and there were numerous flare-ups overnight on the island of Evia, near Athens, where the flames have laid waste to swathes of forest and killed thousands of farm animals.
Workers have toiled since dawn to repair serious damage to Evia’s electricity network and some villages were facing problems with water supply.
Further south on Crete, reports said fires that broke out on Saturday afternoon and destroyed four houses and a church and largely been contained.
In Kryoneri north of Athens, police were reportedly bolstering security as fears grow that looters could target houses abandoned by residents fleeing a fire that erupted on Saturday afternoon but was mostly contained on Sunday.
“We are fighting here. What can we do,” asked Kryoneri Giorgos, wearing a mask to protect himself from the smoke.
He said on Saturday afternoon he and others were battling to save “the work of a lifetime.”
“By the time I got here the flames were already up here. It all happened so fast,” said Alexandros Andonopoulos, who rushed from Athens to the village.
“Fortunately the firemen arrived quickly.”
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis wrote on social media that anyone who lost possessions “should know that the state will be by their side.”
He said Saturday was a “titanic” struggle but “the picture today looks better and the battle continues with all available resources.”
Greece has endured heatwave conditions for almost a week, with temperatures passing 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) in many areas.
On Saturday, the temperature reached 45.2C in Amfilohia, in western Greece.
The extreme heat is expected to die down from Monday.
Last month, fires on Greece’s fifth-biggest island Chios, in the northern Aegean, destroyed 4,700 hectares of land, while early July a wildfire on Crete forced the evacuation of 5,000 people.
The most destructive year for wildfires in the country that is deemed a climate change hotspot, was 2023, when nearly 175,000 hectares were lost and there were 20 deaths.
Greece, like many countries is experiencing hotter summers stoked by human-induced climate change, which increases the length, frequency and intensity of wildfires.
