Greece enlists help from European allies to tackle raging wildfires

Czech firefighters and Italian aircraft join fight against blazes that have ravaged homes and forced evacuations

Greece is battling wildfires that have ravaged homes and led to evacuations for a second day, with the help of Czech firefighters and Italian aircraft expected to arrive later on Sunday.

The wildfires were raging on Sunday morning in the Peloponnese area west of the capital, as well as on the islands of Evia and Kythera, 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”, the fire brigade spokesperson Vassilis Vathrakogiannis said, though he added that the situation was improving.

Forecasters predicted the strong winds that have fanned the flames would die down 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 early on Sunday to people on the island, which lies off the south-eastern tip of the Peloponnese, as the fires continued unabated.

“Houses, beehives, olive trees have been burnt,” Giorgos Komninos, the deputy mayor of Kythera, told local outlet ERT News. “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 on Saturday morning and forced the evacuation of a popular tourist beach.

Greece had requested help from EU allies and two Italian aircraft were expected on 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 flare-ups overnight on the island of Evia, near Athens, where the flames have destroyed swathes of forest and killed thousands of farm animals.

Workers have been scrambling 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 had been largely contained.

Police were reportedly bolstering forces in Kryoneri, north of Athens, as fears grow that looters could target houses abandoned by their owners fleeing a fire that erupted on Saturday afternoon but was mostly contained on Sunday.

Greece has endured heatwave conditions for almost a week, with temperatures passing 40C (104F) in many areas.

On Saturday, the temperature reached 45.2C in Amfilochia, 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 (11,600 acres) of land. In early July, a wildfire on Crete forced the evacuation of 5,000 people.

The most destructive year for wildfires was 2023, when nearly 175,000 hectares were lost and there were 20 deaths.

Cover photo:  Local people caught in the smoke of a wildfire in Kryoneri, near Athens, on Saturday. Photograph: Angelos Tzortzinis/AFP/Getty Images