Helicopters, firefighters with lifeboats and the army take part in an operation on Thursday to rescue dozens of residents of several villages stranded by flooding due to torrential rains in Thessaly, the great plain of central Greece .
Heavy rainfall hit the Magnesia department, 300 km north of Athens, on Monday and Tuesday, notably its capital the port city of Volos and the villages of Mount Pilion, before affecting localities around Karditsa and Trikala, in Thessaly.
In many places, river floods have transformed the streets into veritable torrents, houses are underwater, cars have been swept away by the floods in the villages of Vlohos, Metamorfosi, Palamas, Keramidi and Farkadona, victims of which are also victims of Power cuts.
Described as an “extreme phenomenon in terms of the quantity of water falling in the space of 24 hours” by experts, the storm called “Daniel” has so far left four dead and at least six missing, including two Austrian tourists in Pilion, the Austrian Foreign Ministry announced on Thursday.
In Farkadona, 330 km northwest of the Greek capital, the water level reached more than a meter and many homes were flooded, according to an AFP journalist.
“This is one of the most difficult moments of my life, the water entered the house last night (Wednesday), the children are at a neighbor’s house,” Eleftheria Kotarela, a farmer in her forties, told AFP. , mother of three children, her eyes full of tears.
“The situation is dramatic, the quantity of water is so significant and I don’t think we are going to escape damage,” said Dimitris Théodorou, 70, whose corn fields are flooded.
The plain of Thessaly, the largest in Greece, crossed by long rivers, is “an immense lake”, exclaimed Yannis Artopios, the spokesman for the Greek firefighters, on Ert, public television.
Rescue helicopters are transferring evacuees to the Karditsa stadium, according to images broadcast by Ert.
“The village of Vlohos is underwater and only helicopters can rescue its inhabitants,” Gogo Kartsana, originally from the region, told Ert.
Sixty-four people are stranded in the villages of Agia Triada, Kalyvia and Kalogriana, near Karditsa, lamented Vassilis Kikilias, the Minister of Civil Protection and Climate Crisis.
He explained that traffic was “very difficult between Trikala and Karditsa due to the “high water level” and intervention teams with divers” and rescue boats were dispatched to the site, he explained. added.
A total of 480 firefighters with 195 vehicles supported by the army are taking part in the rescue operations, but the authorities fear an increase in the number of victims.
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis had to postpone his visit to northern Greece and a major speech planned for Saturday and set up a relief coordination unit in Larissa, a large city in Thessaly.
The height of the water “reached between 1.5 and two meters” and “the inhabitants of the localities concerned are stuck in their homes without any help”, Giorgos Sakellariou, the mayor of Palamas, told the private television channel Skai.
This bad weather follows devastating fires this summer in Greece which left at least 26 dead.
“We are unfortunately going from one natural disaster to another in Greece (…). It is not a question of forest fires this time but of floods” said Balazs Ujvari, the spokesperson for the European Commission, during a press briefing in Brussels.
“If additional assistance is needed, including through the EU Civil Protection Mechanism, we will do everything possible,” he promised.
With global warming, the atmosphere contains more water vapor (about 7% for each additional degree), increasing the risk of heavy precipitation events which, together with other factors such as urbanization, lead to flooding.
In Turkey and Bulgaria, two countries bordering Greece, torrential rains in recent days have caused a total of 12 deaths.
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07/09/2023 18:21:42 – Farkadóna (Greece) (AFP) – © 2023 AFP
