Twin blazes near Athens kill
Hundreds of people race to beaches to be evacuated
The worst Greek forest fires in a decade have killed at least 49 people near Athens while more than 100 others were injured.
The official report had been 24 until rescue crews found the bodies of more than 20 people huddled closely together near a beach northeast of the capital.
Gale-fanned bushfires on either side of Athens raged through holiday resorts near the capital, leaving lines of cars torched, charred farms and forests.
Hundreds of people raced to beaches to be evacuated by navy vessels, yachts and fishing boats.
Winds reached 80km/h as authorities deployed the country’s entire fleet of water-dropping planes and helicopters to give tourists time to escape.
Military drones remained in the air in the high winds to help officials direct more than 600 firefighters on the ground.
“We were unlucky. The wind changed and it came at us with such force that it razed the coastal area in minutes,” said Evangelos Bournous, Mayor of the port town of Rafina, a sleepy mainland port that serves Greek holiday islands.
Greece issued an urgent appeal for help to tackle fires which also raged uncontrolled in several places across the country, destroying homes, disrupting major transport links and sending people fleeing for their lives. Greece said it needed air and land assets from its European Union partners.
The dock area of Rafina became a makeshift hospital as paramedics checked survivors when they came off coast guard vessels and private boats. The operation continued through the night.
The death toll rose further after the coast guard counted four bodies recovered at sea, a short distance from the fires.
At daybreak local time, Ambulance Service deputy director Miltiadis Mylonas said the number of casualties was likely to rise as the more gutted homes and cars were checked.
“It took people by surprise and the events happened very fast. Also, the fires broke out on many fronts, so all these factors made the situation extremely difficult,” he said.
An ominous cloud of black-orange smoke hung over the Acropolis hill and the Parthenon temple in Athens.
The fire posed no immediate threat to Greece’s famed ancient monuments, but as it raged inland children’s’ summer camps and holiday homes were hastily abandoned. Fleeing drivers clogged highways into the capital, hampering the firefighting effort, and flecks of ash swirled onto central Athens.
It was the deadliest fire season to hit Greece since more than 60 people were killed in 2007 when huge fires swept across the southern Peloponnese region.
“It’s a difficult night for Greece,” Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said after flying back to Athens from a trip to Bosnia that was cut short.
Authorities said Cyprus and Spain had offered assistance after the request for EU help was made.
Greek Fire Service officials issued public pleas for residents in fireaffected areas to comply with evacuation orders and not stay on in an effort trying to save their homes.
Rafina’s Mayor said he believed about 100 houses in that area had burned. The fire service was not able to confirm the figure.
Showers that passed over the Greek capital yesterday missed the two big fires — one at Rafina, 30km to the east, and the other at Kineta, 55km to the west.
The damage was severe in Mati village, 30km east of Athens, in the Rafina region.
“Mati doesn’t even exist as a settlement anymore,” one woman told Greece’s Skai TV. “I saw corpses, burned-out cars. I feel lucky to be alive.”
Rafina is popular with local tourists, particularly pensioners and children.
One of the youngest victims was thought to be a 6-month-old baby who died of smoke inhalation.
At Kineta, at least 220 firefighters were on the scene, while five waterdropping planes and seven helicop-