{"id":321014,"date":"2021-08-10T23:03:20","date_gmt":"2021-08-10T20:03:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/greeks-battle-to-protect-town-from-ferocious-blaze\/"},"modified":"2021-08-10T23:03:20","modified_gmt":"2021-08-10T20:03:20","slug":"greeks-battle-to-protect-town-from-ferocious-blaze","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/greeks-battle-to-protect-town-from-ferocious-blaze\/","title":{"rendered":"#Greeks battle to protect town from ferocious blaze"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Greeks battle to protect town from ferocious blaze<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

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\"Nearly
\n Nearly 900 firefighters, reinforced overnight with fresh arrivals from abroad, were deployed on the country’s second largest island as major towns and resorts remained under threat.
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Volunteers and firefighters were working relentlessly Tuesday, often without masks or helmets, in a desperate bid to stop a violent blaze from reaching a key town on Greece’s Evia island, one of hundreds of fires that have raged through the country.<\/p>\n


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Nearly 900 firefighters, reinforced with fresh arrivals from abroad, were deployed on the country’s second largest island as major towns and resorts remained under threat on from a blaze burning for eight days.<\/p>\n

Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis announced a package of 500 million euros ($586 million) in emergency help to those affected by what he has dubbed a “natural fury without precedent”, as well as for reconstruction of devastated areas.<\/p>\n

Weather disasters bulked up by climate change have swept the globe this summer, with a landmark UN assessment published Monday warning the world is warming even faster than forecast.<\/p>\n

Hundreds of homes have been lost in Evia, greater Athens, the Peloponnese and other parts of Greece to wildfires since late July, as the region suffers through an intense heatwave.<\/p>\n

Underscoring the violent swings of fortune tormenting Greece, fires in the Peloponnese flared anew just an hour after officials said the situation was stabilising.<\/p>\n

Residents in 20 small villages in the region of Gortynia were warned to evacuate on Tuesday, with the mayor saying conditions seemed out of control again.<\/p>\n

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\"Firefighters
\n Firefighters from Serbia joined the battle near the village of Avgaria.
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“In the blink of an eye, all control was lost,” mayor Efstathios Soulis told state TV ERT, adding that dozens of villages, agricultural units and businesses were at risk.<\/p>\n

The flames have claimed three lives in Greece, while in neighbouring Turkey eight have been killed eight. Several people have been injured, some critically.<\/p>\n

Sixteen people have been arrested on suspicion of arson or negligent arson, the police said.<\/p>\n

‘Where to go?’<\/b><\/p>\n

Much of the attention was focused Tuesday on keeping the fire out of Evia’s northern hub of Istiaia, which has 7,000 residents who had yet to evacuate.<\/p>\n

Firefighters and volunteers had been engaged overnight in “hand-to-hand combat, fighting heart and soul” to erect fire breaks outside villages neighbouring Istiaia, mayor Yiannis Kontzias said.<\/p>\n

Locals, often in just t-shirts, battled the flames on several fronts, one of which raged out of control.<\/p>\n

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\"Wildfires
\n Wildfires on Greek island.
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The Evia force includes hundreds of firefighters from Romania, Serbia and Ukraine. They were reinforced on Tuesday with units from Cyprus, Slovakia and Poland, the civil protection authority said.<\/p>\n

The rugged island is popular with holidaymakers and many Greeks have summer homes on Evia. Some 3,000 people were evacuated by sea this past week as the flames neared.<\/p>\n

Authorities ordered the evacuation of Asiminio, a coastal village near Istiaia also threatened by flames, on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

“Where do you want us to go?,” a woman in her sixties shouted, refusing to leave as helicopters flew ahead.<\/p>\n

On the streets, dozens of residents pointed angrily at a Slovakian firefighting truck. “Look, they’re doing all the work. Where are ours? We beg them to come and no one comes,” said Dimitri.<\/p>\n

In Avgaria village, many people turned out to help the professionals. <\/p>\n

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\"Authorities
\n Authorities ordered the evacuation of Asiminio. ‘Where do you want us to go?’ a woman shouted.
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“If we don’t come, who will?” asked Yiannis, a burly man in his 20s. “My aunt’s house burnt down, that of my grandfather almost did too.”<\/p>\n

The fire has also wrought havoc on the island’s agricultural economy that included olives, figs and honey, leaving many producers despondent.<\/p>\n

Istiaia Mayor Kontzias said “mistakes were made and we need to draw lessons from this”. <\/p>\n

“The Greek state must never forget what happ<\/a>ened in northern Evia,” he added. “Helicopters helped a lot and if we had done that since the beginning, we would have avoided all this destruction.”<\/p>\n

He was echoing a complaint widely heard about the lack of air support not just on Evia but throughout Greece.<\/p>\n

Many mayors around the country have complained of a serious lack of aerial support in fighting the fires, despite government assurances of having set aside ample resources.<\/p>\n

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\"The
\n The fire on Evia seen from above.
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‘Dagger to the heart’<\/b><\/p>\n

“Every lost home is a tragedy, a dagger to the heart,” Deputy Civil Protection Minister Nikos Hardalias said Tuesday, his voice breaking. <\/p>\n

In a televised address on Monday, Mitsotakis apologised “for any shortcomings” in the state response.<\/p>\n

“We may have done what was humanly possible, but in many cases it was not enough.”<\/p>\n

EU states and other countries have so far contributed 21 aircraft, 250 vehicles and more than 1,200 firefighters, some of whom were due to arrive by Friday.<\/p>\n\n

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Desperate Greeks flee as fires ravage Evia island\n <\/p><\/div>\n

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\n \u00a9 2021 AFP<\/p>\n

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Citation<\/strong>:
\n Greeks battle to protect town from ferocious blaze (2021, August 10)
\n retrieved 10 August 2021
\n from https:\/\/phys.org\/news<\/a>\/2021-08-greeks-town-ferocious-blaze.html<\/p>\n

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