Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said that Greece faced “extreme weather conditions and winds” with speeds often reaching 27.8 m per second.
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Aircraft cannot extinguish due to wind
“When winds blow with such force, even dozens of our available aircraft cannot operate safely,” he wrote on the social network Facebook. “There are moments when nature and the intensity of weather phenomena surpass any human planning and any operational capabilities.”
Almost 500 firefighters fought fires around the popular coastal village of Porto Germeno, located about 70 kilometers northwest of Athens, the fire department reported.
They are trying to prevent the fire from approaching the western outskirts of Athens after it crossed over a mountain during the night.
About 100 firefighters fought another fire in the northern part of the Peloponnese.
Late Saturday, a new fire broke out on the island of Kefalonia in the Ionian Sea.
The climate monitoring service of the National Observatory, meteo.gr, reported that preliminary estimates indicate that more than 6,500 hectares burned in separate fires in the Corinth Gulf area, which also included Porto Germeno.
Porto Germeno and other villages were evacuated when the fire broke out on Friday. Local authorities say dozens of homes were damaged or destroyed.
“Megafire”
Earlier this week, fires on the islands of Crete and Paros destroyed another 6,000 hectares, meteo.gr reports.
However, National Observatory researcher and forest fire meteorologist Theodoros Gianaras said that the fires around Porto Germeno appear to have affected more than 10,000 hectares – almost twice as much as initially thought.
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“Unfortunately, it is very likely (if not almost certain) that this particular forest fire will be classified as a ‘megafire’,” Gianaras wrote on Facebook.
Firefighters face dozens of fires daily, and Greece’s Minister of Civil Protection Evangelos Tournas said on Saturday that the fire service was “forced to work at the limit of its capabilities.”
Three firefighters died this week while on duty: two in Crete and one in the Peloponnese.
Storm winds created “extremely difficult conditions, in many cases preventing aircraft from either collecting or dropping water due to extreme turbulence,” said E. Tournas.
Although winds eased late Saturday, on Sunday the Athens region and nearby Boeotia and the island of Euboea faced near-maximum fire danger, the Ministry of Civil Protection reported.
Like the rest of the Mediterranean region, Greece is severely affected by the climate crisis, causing forest fires every summer due to high temperatures, frequent heatwaves, and drought.
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