Three firefighters die during Greece wildfires

Three firefighters died on Wednesday as crews battled forest fires across Greece, where gale-force winds drove blazes on Crete, several Aegean islands and parts of the Peloponnese.

The fire department said two firefighters died on Crete during an operation to contain a rural forest fire. Deputy fire department spokesman Yiannis Artopios said the two “fell in the line of duty”.

State broadcaster ERT said the two men were trapped by flames in their fire engine in the foothills of a mountain near the western city of Rethymno. Local municipal official Sifis Vavourakis told ERT the fire front near Rethymno was more than 15 kilometres long and was out of control.

The fire department said more than 150 firefighters and eight aircraft had been sent to the area. Local mayor Yiannis Tatarakis told ERT that shifting winds were complicating aerial firefighting and that six villages had been evacuated.

A third firefighter was found unconscious near the Peloponnese port of Gytheio, a fire department spokesman said. Media reports said he had died of pathological causes.

With winds of up to 74 kilometres per hour, other fires were burning on Paros and Lesbos, and in Messinia and Laconia in the Peloponnese. Local authorities said around 10 villages on Paros were evacuated on Tuesday and Wednesday, although conditions improved later in the day.

Near Plomari on Lesbos, the fire department said 50 firefighters, 13 engines and six aircraft were fighting a blaze that broke out near a landfill.

The civil protection ministry placed several areas on near-maximum fire alert for Thursday, including Crete, the greater Athens area, the eastern Peloponnese and most of the Aegean islands.

A 71-year-old man also died on Tuesday from injuries from a fire outside Kozani in northern Greece. Dozens of other forest fires have broken out across the country, fuelled by strong winds, though firefighters managed to bring them under control before they caused casualties or significant damage.

Greece faces destructive wildfires almost every summer as prolonged drought, high temperatures and strong winds help blazes spread. Last week, a three-day heatwave pushed temperatures as high as 43C in some parts of the country. Greece’s meteorological service said it was only the third time since 2011 that temperatures had exceeded 40C so late in the season.