The bodies of 18 people have been found in an area of north-east Greece where firefighters are battling a major wildfire, authorities have said, as a record-breaking late summer heatwave continues to sear swathes of continental Europe,
The Guardian reports.
Hundreds of firefighters were struggling on Tuesday to contain dozens of outbreaks, including several burning out of control for several days that have forced widespread evacuations, in the second deadly wave of blazes in Greece in a month.
The bodies were found near a shack in the Avanta area north of the city of Alexandroupolis near Greece’s borders with Turkey and Bulgaria, authorities said, and a disaster victim identification team was working to identify them.
A fire service spokesperson, Ioannis Artopios, said that since no reports of missing people had been filed in the area, where a fire has been burning out of control for four days, it was possible the victims were migrants who had entered from Turkey.
The discovery brings the overall toll from this week’s fires in Greece to 20, after the body of another person thought to be a migrant was found in the same area on Monday and an elderly shepherd was found dead at the site of a blaze north of Athens.
Local media described a “massive wall of flames” racing through forests towards Alexandroupolis overnight, prompting authorities to evacuate another eight villages on top of the dozen whose inhabitants had already been ordered to leave.
The port city’s hospital was also closed and its more than 100 patients evacuated to a ferry and other hospitals in northern Greece. The deputy health minister, Dimitris Vartzopoulos, said airborne smoke and ash were the main reason for the closure.
