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Firemen battle to control fire
17/08/2007 18:08 - (SA)
Athens - Hundreds of Greek firemen battled through the night to bring a forest fire threatening Athens under control early on Friday after it destroyed dozens of homes and forced hundreds to flee.
But more than 300 firemen backed by three helicopters dropping water on the flames were still fighting the blaze on Mount Pentelikon north of the capital on Friday, emergency services said.
More than 10 homes in the wealthy district were destroyed on Thursday when firemen also had to evacuate two clinics as winds of more than 80 km per hour pushed flames toward them.
Some 130 patients were moved from a clinic in Melissia, some 20km from central Athens. Another 21 people were moved from a nearby health centre.
One firefighter was injured in the operation and one emergency vehicle was burned. A dark cloud of smoke covered much of northern Athens.
Answering criticism that fire services had reacted too slowly to the latest fire in the Athens suburbs, police spokesperson Evangelos Falaras said water-bombing planes had been hampered by smoke and the violent winds.
The fire services said the forest fire may have been deliberately started.
Summer fires are regularly blamed on property speculators who burn forests in protected zones so they can then build on the land, even illegally.
Widespread damage
The fire ravaged a pine grove recently reforested after two big fires in 1995 and 1998 destroyed thousands of hectares (acres) of trees.
Thursday's blaze was the latest in a series that have hit Greece this summer, including areas close to the capital. The blazes followed weeks of drought and heatwave.
A fire on Mount Parnitha, also overlooking Athens, in early July caused widespread damage.
The fires in Greece have killed eight people, including five fire-fighters, and burned huge swathes of forest and scrub land. Two water-bomber pilots were killed when their aircraft crashed battling a blaze on the island of Evia.
The appointment this month of a retired police brigadier to head a fire prevention ranger corps was attacked by critics who dismissed it as a body staffed by near-pensioners.
The corps will initially number 1 700 rangers and will eventually reach 4 500, said the public order ministry.
Much of southern Europe has been hit by drought caused by an intense heatwave which has been blamed for scores of deaths from Bulgaria in eastern Europe through to Spain in the west.
- AFP
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