| Sports |
By DOMINIC HUGHES
Greeks facing impossible choices
EVIA ISLAND, Greece: Looking out from
the mainland in the early morning, Evia is just a hazy outline.
It is the smoke from the overnight fires that obscures the view.
And on the island itself the smell of wood smoke is never far
away.
The worst-affected areas are easy to spot – there the smoke
rises in thick black clouds.
Once you are close enough to see the flames themselves, the heat
from the burning scrub and trees is intense.
And the fire-front moves incredibly quickly, pushed along by a
hot, dry wind that makes the firefighters’ job almost
impossible.
We had driven up into the hills behind the town of Aliveri with
fire on one side of the road.
It quickly jumped the track and soon it was impossible to drive
back down the way we had come.
We came across a man using just a leaky garden hose to try and
damp down flames right at the edge of his property. He sold
building supplies, and his shop was full of highly flammable
liquids.
It was desperate stuff, with friends and family helping to beat
down the flames with whatever they could lay their hands on.
In the end the building was saved, but it was a close-run thing.
Just a few miles down the coast, they were not so lucky.
The fickle fires had swept though a modern housing estate,
gutting some houses but sparing others.
Wooden telegraph poles were still smouldering and some had
collapsed all together.
Charred trees and ash were all that remained between the houses.
The hillside behind the estate was the colour of grey ash, an
eerie lunar landscape.
The only sounds were of people clearing up the debris in the
houses, sweeping up shattered clay roof tiles. Some do not want
to leave their houses when the fires come. You can hardly blame
them.
A fire in a house will destroy everything in a way that
flooding, for example, will not. Photos, clothes, books – it all
goes.
So people are faced with an impossible choice – stay and try to
save something, or run and lose it all.
Both carry risks. More than 60 people have now died. Some were
volunteer firefighters, some were caught in their houses, others
died while trying to get away.
But the big question many are asking is where did these fires
come from?
Many people we have spoken to share the government’s belief that
these fires were started deliberately, and most point the finger
at unscrupulous property developers.
A spokesman for the national developers’ organisation says those
claims are ridiculous.
But others argue that so many fires started in so many places
and at the same time just cannot be a coincidence.
And the problem is that once these fires start, it is incredibly
difficult to put them out.
The hills are rough and thickly wooded, and everything is tinder
dry. With the wind behind it, a fire can quickly become
unmanageable.
Huge water-bombing aircraft seem to be the best weapons, flying
low over the fires and releasing a deluge of water.
It is highly skilled and dangerous work and despite
reinforcements from France, Italy and across Europe, there is
only so much they can achieve.
The best hope is a change in the weather. Forecasters predict
that the wind will drop, which would help.
What is really needed is a good dose of rain, but this is Greece
in late August – so there is no sign of that. – BBC
 
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