They were citizens of Greece and Denmark, and two living found persons – a Greek and a Brit.
“The pilots (…) were unconscious and taken to the hospital, where their death was confirmed,” said the Fire Protection Department communications director Vasilis Vatrakojanis (Vassilis Vathrakogiannis) on television.
The crew of the second helicopter was rescued.
The aircraft were “Bell” helicopters flying over the Psata district west of Athens, each with two crew members. Foreign firefighters and helicopter crews are often deployed in Greece to help fight forest fires during the country’s hot and dry summers.
The flames quickly spread in western Attica, threatening communities and an industrial area beyond Megara, and strong gusts hindered firefighting aircraft from scooping water from the sea.
Strong winds pushed the flames deeper into the region of the Greek capital and forced new evacuations; France is guarding an area still burning, four times larger than Paris, while in Spain large fires have stopped spreading.
The largest forest fire in France remained contained within its perimeter; it forced the evacuation of 224 thousand people in what is believed to be the largest civilian evacuation in the country outside of wartime.
Fire hotspots were still burning over an area of 420 sq km, thousands of people cannot return home, and nearly 3 thousand firefighters were deployed to fight a huge fire in Gironde and a second, still uncontrolled fire in Provence.
Together, the fires in France and Spain forced about a third of a million people to leave their homes and holiday spots, emptied communities in the heart of the European summer heat, and pushed emergency services to work at the limit of their capacity during simultaneous disasters.
