Strong winds fan blaze near Athens, other sites and the Peloponnese peninsula

Greek authorities ordered the evacuation of a village near the capital in a horrendous weekend during which five people were taken to hospital, including a fireman with burns.

A local resident helps firefighters to extinguish the fire of a burning house during a wildfire in Kryoneri, near Athens, on Saturday. Picture: Angelos Tzortzinis / AFP

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Greece on Saturday requested EU help to battle wildfires that have sprung up in different regions, one of the worst just north of Athens destroying houses and forcing police to evacuate homes.

The fires broke out nearly a week into a heatwave, in which temperatures have passed 45C.

Strong winds were fanning the blaze near Athens and other sites and the Peloponnese peninsula that juts out west of the capital, fire brigade spokesman Vasileios Vathrakogiannis said.

They were also feeding the flames on the islands of Crete, ­Euboea and Kythera, he added: “The hard part is ahead of us.”

Several regions were under the highest level of alert – Red Category 5 – meaning an extreme risk of wildfires, due to the hot and dry conditions.

Firefighters had brought 44 fires under control out of 52 that had broken out over the past 24 hours, the spokesman said.

A firefighter tries to extinguish a wildfire as a helicopter flies, in the northwestern suburb of Kryoneri, in Athens. Picture: Yorgos Karahalis/AP

Greece had requested Euro­pean assistance through the Resc­EU mechanism, asking for six firefighting aircraft to bolster efforts to contain the fires, he said.

Firefighting units from the Czech Republic were already operating as part of European ­assistance. One of the most difficult fronts was just 30km north of Athens, where authorities ordered the evacuation of a village, Drosopigi, firefighters said.

Several houses in Drosopigi were ablaze, as strong winds pushed flames through the buildings.

One front of the fire had reached Kryoneri, another village farther north, where houses were also burning.

Police said they had evacuated at least 27 people from their ­houses.

Five people were taken to hospital. A fireman with burns, three people suffering breathing difficulties and an old woman who appeared to have suffered a stroke.

The smell of the burning wood carried as far as the centre of Athens.

Another wildfire, on the island of Kythera, trapped dozens of people on a beach; they had to be rescued by a coastguard vessel and three private boats.

The fire there was burning trees planted after an earlier devastating fire in 2017.

The heatwave, which started in Greece last Monday, was expected to last until the coming Monday, the country’s weather service said.

The National Observatory in Athens said the warmest temperature recorded on Friday was 45.8C in the Peloponnese region of Messinia.

A chopper drops water on a forest blaze. Picture: AP Photo/Yorgos Karahalis

On Saturday, the temperature reached 45.2C in Amfilohia, in western Greece.

On the island of Euboea, also called Evia, northeast of Athens, two fire trucks were destroyed and five firemen taken to hospital with light injuries.

“The situation is out of control,” Giorgos Psathas, the mayor of Chalcis, told the Athens-Macedonian News Agency.

“The destruction is immeas­urable.”

In the Peloponnese’s Messinia region, evacuations were also under way because of the threat posed by the fire.

The head of the fire brigade put all services there on general alert, fire services spokesman Mr Vathrakogiannis said.

Civil protection authorities said the risk of fire remained “very high” on Sunday, particularly in Attica, central and western Greece, and Crete.

Hundreds of firemen and forest commandos were due to keep battling the blazes through the night, with firefighting aircraft expected to rejoin the battle at first light on Sunday.

In June, fires on Greece’s fifth-biggest island Chios, in the northern Aegean, destroyed 4700ha of land.

Earlier this month, a wildfire on the island of Crete forced the evacuation of 5000 tourists.

The most destructive year for wildfires was 2023, when 20 ­people were killed and nearly 175,000ha were lost.

With agencies