A Canadian-built plane fighting wildfires in Greece crashed on Tuesday, as Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis warned of tough days ahead, with blazes destroying homes and forcing the evacuation of thousands of tourists from the island of Rhodes.
Two pilots were killed when their Canadair CL-215 plane crashed on the island of Evia, east of Athens, the air force said. It gave their ages as 34 and 27.
Video from state-owed ERT TV showed the bright yellow aircraft releasing its load of water before its wingtip apparently snagged a tree branch. Moments later it disappeared into a deep fold in the ground from which a fireball erupted. The plane had no ejection system.
Mitsotakis cancelled a planned visit to Cyprus for Wednesday, and Greece’s armed forces declared three days of mourning. “They offered their lives to save lives,” Mitsotakis said of the pilots. “They proved how hazardous their daily missions in extinguishing fires are … In their memory, we continue the war against the destructive forces of nature.”
ERT separately reported that the body of a 41-year-old stockbreeder who had been missing since Sunday was found burned in a shack in a hard-to-reach area on Evia.
It was unclear whether he had been killed by the fire or had died of other causes before it broke out.
‘What the entire planet is facing’
A third successive heat wave in Greece pushed temperatures back above 40 C across parts of the country Tuesday amid a string of evacuations from fires that have raged out of control for days, whipped on by strong winds.
It’s still unclear how they started, although tinder-dry conditions amid the summer heat mean the slightest spark can trigger a blaze that will spread fast if not quickly quenched. Several people have been arrested or fined across Greece in recent days for accidentally starting fires.
Mitsotakis said on Tuesday the next few days would be difficult, with conditions possibly improving after Thursday.
“All of us are standing guard,” he said. “In the face of what the entire planet is facing, especially the Mediterranean, which is a climate change hot spot, there is no magical defence mechanism. If there was, we would have implemented it.”
Locals and tourists are fleeing fires on the popular resort island of Rhodes as out-of-control wildfires ravage the island, prompting urgent pleas for help.
An assessment by scientists published Tuesday said human-induced climate change has played an “absolutely overwhelming” role in the extreme heat waves that have swept across North America, southern Europe and China this month.
In Greece, a prosecutor on Rhodes launched an investigation into the causes of the fires and the preparedness and response of authorities, ERT said. It said about 10 per cent of the island’s land area had burned.
‘If I leave there will be no hotel’
Lefteris Laoudikos, whose family owns a small hotel in the seaside resort town of Kiotari, one of the epicentres of the fire over the weekend, said its 200 guests — mainly from Germany, Britain and Poland — fled in rental cars.
He said his father, cousin and two others were trying to douse the flames using a nearby water tank.
“On Saturday, when I saw the wind and that there were no planes, I told everyone, ‘We’re going to burn today,'” he said.
“My father saved the hotel. I called him, and he didn’t want to leave. He told me, ‘If I leave there will be no hotel.'”
John Hatzis, who owns three unaffected hotels in northern Rhodes, said the island needed to welcome back tourists.
“After the superhuman efforts to contain the fire, we need superhuman efforts to restart tourism now,” he said.
More than 2,000 vacationers had returned home by plane on Monday and tour operators cancelled upcoming trips. TUI dropped flights to Rhodes through Friday. It said it had 39,000 customers on Rhodes as of Sunday evening.
Rhodes, one of Greece’s biggest islands, is among its top summer destinations, attracting about 1.5 million foreign tourists in the summer months.
About 20,000 people had to leave homes and hotels in Rhodes over the weekend as the inferno spread and reached coastal resorts on the island’s southeast side, after charring land, killing animals and damaging buildings.
After a blaze in the seaside town of Mati, east of Athens, in 2018 killed 104 people, Greece has taken a more proactive approach toward evacuations. But critics say it has not improved its ability to put out fires that are common in summer, though more intense in this year’s heat wave.
Wildfires in Greece are devastating areas that depend on tourism during peak season, creating an economic disaster alongside the physical damage.
The mayor of Rhodes said on Facebook the island was facing an unprecedented ordeal.
There were also fires on the island of Corfu.
Tourism accounts for 18 per cent of Greece’s economic output and one in five jobs. On Rhodes and many other Greek islands, reliance on tourism is even greater.
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