A wildfire fanned by gale-force winds has forced the evacuation of about 5,000 people on the Greek island of Crete, authorities and hotel association officials have said, as large swathes of continental Europe baked in a punishing early summer heatwave linked to at least nine deaths.
About 230 firefighters, along with 46 fire service vehicles and helicopters, were battling the blaze on Thursday after it broke out 24 hours earlier near Ierapetra, on the south-east coast of the island – the country’s largest – threatening to engulf houses and hotels. A fire brigade spokesperson, Vassilis Vathrakogiannis, said: “There are wind gusts in the area, some measuring nine on the Beaufort scale, triggering rekindling and hindering firefighting efforts.” He added that four settlements had been evacuated.
The president of the regional hotels’ association, Yorgos Tzarakis, said about 3,000 tourists and 2,000 residents had been moved, mostly overnight, as a precaution. A small number of people fled into the sea and were rescued by local fishermen and divers. Residents and tourists were taking shelter at an indoor stadium and some had left Crete by boat, authorities said. Local media reported some homes had been damaged.
Ierapetra’s mayor, Manolis Frangoulis, said firefighters were working to prevent flare-ups during a lull in high winds. “Thankfully no one was hurt but it’s a difficult situation,” he said. Like the rest of Crete, Ierapetra – a seaside resort with a permanent population of 23,000 – accommodates thousands of tourists in the summer. The island’s arid, uneven landscape, criss-crossed by gullies, makes it hard for firefighters to tackle blazes.
A separate fire was raging in the Halkidiki region of Greece, with 160 firefighters and 49 vehicles involved in the emergency response. In Turkey, thousands of people fled blazes in Cesme and Ödemiş in the western coastal province of İzmir. An elderly man died in the blaze near Ödemis, about 60 miles east of the city of İzmir, in one of three villages evacuated in the area. “The village was evacuated but an elderly, bedridden patient could not be saved,” a local MP told Turkish TV.
Nearly 500 firefighters were battling wildfires in eastern Germany that severely injured two emergency workers and forced the evacuation of more than 100 people near Gohrischheide, on the border between the states of Saxony and Brandenburg. The blazes had burned through hundreds of hectares of heathland and were still not under control on Thursday, with firefighters unable to tackle outbreaks on a former military training area with unexploded ammunition. Italian authorities issued red alerts for 18 cities, including Bologna, Genoa, Milan, Palermo, Rome and Turin, while at least five people have died in the heatwave in Italy.
