For the sixth day in a row, firefighters battled a fire on the Greek island of Rhodes on Sunday that trapped thousands of tourists and locals, forcing many to spend the night in hotel lobbies, gymnasiums, schools or on boats in the harbor.
Greek officials said no major injuries had been reported so far, although nine people were briefly hospitalized, most suffering from breathing difficulties. Some vacationers described a chaotic rescue effort and criticized tour operators for flying them to the island despite the raging fire.
Helen Tonks, a British tourist, said in a phone call that she and her husband and three children arrived in Rhodes on Saturday evening for a “living nightmare”. She said the hotel she had booked had already been evacuated, and so had her family Spent the night in a school It was turned into a crisis center.
“We should never have come,” Ms. Tonks said, accusing tour operators of neglecting customer safety. “At no time did they tell us we were in danger,” he said. “It was business as usual.”
Wildfires in Rhodes are among hundreds that have broken out across Greece in the past week, fueled by parched-dry conditions as a heatwave sweeps the country. Other countries across southern Europe have struggled with baking conditions and other extreme weather; While some regions have matched or broken temperature records, others are still experiencing violent storms.
Temperatures in central Greece were set to reach 113 degrees Fahrenheit, about 45 degrees Celsius, on Sunday, prompting authorities to close the Acropolis and other ancient sites.
During the night, Coast Guard ships evacuated thousands of people from the coastal areas of Rhodes threatened by fire to safer parts of the island. Television footage showed long lines of people, including many children, walking to safety under orange skies and standing on beaches in darkness as authorities helped them to rescue boats. Other images showed hundreds of people spread out on mattresses in gymnasiums as volunteers distributed water.
About 19,000 people – locals and tourists, many of them Britons – were evacuated from the blaze on the island on Saturday night, according to Ioannis Artopios, a spokesman for the Greek fire service. In western Greece, fire service resources were further stretched on Sunday after a bridge collapsed in the city of Patras. At least one person died and eight others were hospitalized in the disaster, officials said, as firefighters continued to search through the wreckage.
In Rhodes, British playwright and screenwriter Paul Kalburgi, who was vacationing with his family, said he was evacuated from three hotels on Saturday. For the first time, he said, he and his family fled for their lives with a wet towel on their head in their hotel. After the third evacuation, he spent the night in the hotel lobby, watching the flames in the distance, he said.
“Fire looks terrible in the dark,” Mr Kalburgi wrote in a message to a New York Times reporter late on Saturday. On Sunday morning, staff at the hotel where they were sheltered said the roads were open but there were no cars or taxis and therefore no practical way to reach the island’s airport.
“It’s completely helpless. Where is the help? No one knows anything,” noted Mr. Kalaburgi. He had booked a flight ticket and was expecting to leave on Sunday evening. “Fingers crossed we’ll make it to the airport,” he said.
Actor Robert Sladen, who arrived in Rhodes from London with his husband on Friday, said he had only followed one instinct since the flames began threatening their resort: “Getting away from the fire — hitchhiking, walking or taking buses.”
Mr Sladen said he could still feel the heat of the flames as he walked along the seafront road with thousands of others to escape. They stopped at an inn, intending to spend the night there, but fire soon threatened that shelter as well, and they were forced to move on again.
Several other tourists recounted similar harrowing experiences and what they said were mostly futile attempts to seek advice from travel agencies they flew to the island.
Firefighters were battling a large fire in the south of Evia, Greece’s second-largest island near Athens, whose northern part was ravaged by wildfires two years ago. Authorities ordered the evacuation of four villages in the south of the island on Sunday afternoon. And new fires broke out in central and southern Greece and on the island of Corfu in the Ionian Sea, another popular destination for British tourists.
On Sunday, British airline and tour operator Jet2 said it had Flights are cancelled Rhodes is scheduled until next Sunday. Another British operator, Tui, said it had also canceled flights to Rhodes for the next few days, saying the company was doing all it could to support customers on the island.
The Greek Foreign Ministry said on Sunday it would set up an assistance center at Rhodes International Airport to help tourists who lost their passports in the evacuation.
As authorities in Rhodes scramble to help thousands leave the island, Greece’s transport ministry said 14 departure flights carrying 2,700 passengers with Tui and Jet2 were scheduled to leave Rhodes airport at 3am on Monday.
But it said there would be a total of 44 flights arriving and departing before midnight, suggesting more people were flying to the island (it was unclear how many of those arriving were tourists).
Britain’s Simon Warne, who traveled to Rhodes on Thursday for a wedding, said he spent Saturday night at the island’s school. Like others, he praised the kindness of local residents and volunteers in the chaotic, terrifying situation.
“A special mention to the locals who brought us food, drinks, towels at 4am” He wrote “Some amazing lady drove us 50km back to our hotel and won’t accept any money no matter how hard we try,” he added on Twitter.
A similar experience was described by Mrs. Tonks. “The locals are amazing,” he said. “It’s humbling.” Late Sunday, she was still stuck at school.
Fire service spokesman Mr Artopios told Greek television that efforts to put out the fires, which were raging on three fronts of the island and were fueled by strong winds, continued on Sunday. Planes dropped water on the flames and firefighters worked through the night to protect residential areas, he said, making the evacuation operation the biggest ever in Greece.
British dramatist Mr. Kalburgi arrived at Rhodes Airport with his family on Sunday evening after booking a flight to Crete and was hoping to persuade the airline to switch to a flight back to New Zealand, where he and his family live.
“I sat on the floor crying during check-in,” she wrote in the message. “It was very upsetting to drive through the burnt roads. The local people have lost so much and they are so kind.
Emma Bubola Contributed reporting from London.
