Thousands of tourists and residents fleeing a wildfire on Rhodes huddled in schools and shelters on Sunday, with many evacuated on private boats from beaches to safer areas of the Greek island when flames moved towards resorts and coastal villages.
Thousands more spent the night outdoors and tour operators Jet2, TUI and Correndon cancelled flights departing for the island, which is located in southeastern Greece and is popular with holidaymakers for its beaches and historic sites.
Greek fire brigade spokesperson Ioannis Artopoios said 19,000 people had been moved from homes and hotels, calling it the biggest safe transport of residents and tourists Greece has carried out.
British tourist Amy Leyden described the “terrifying” experience of being moved from two hotels with her 11-year-old daughter, before being taken to the safety of a school.
“We were walking down the road at 2 o’clock in the morning and the fire was catching up with us,” she told Sky News.
“I didn’t think we were going to make it.” Coastguard vessels and dozens of private boats carried more than 3,000 tourists from beaches on Saturday after the wildfire, which has burned for nearly a week, was fanned by strong winds and rekindled along the southeastern part of the island, Greece’s third most populated with around 125,000 residents. “It was literally like the end of the world,” another British tourist Ian Murison told Sky from a rescue ship taking people to the main city in the north of the island. Murison described chaotic scenes of large groups of tourists on a beach scrambling to board coaches.
Many fled hotels when huge flames reached the seaside villages of Kiotari, Gennadi, Pefki, Lindos, Lardos and Kalathos. Crowds gathered in the streets under a red sky waiting to be taken to safety. Smoke hung heavy over a deserted beach.
Volunteers fought to extinguish a blaze that blackened the hillside and charred buildings near Lindos, which is famed for an acropolis on a massive rock within medieval walls. “We have between 4,000 and 5,000 people now accommodated at different structures,” Thanasis Virinis, a vice mayor of Rhodes told Mega television on Sunday, calling for donations of essentials such as mattresses and bedclothes.
One pregnant woman and another person were hospitalized due to the wildfire, fire brigade spokesperson Artopoios said.—Agencies
