The fire continues uncontrollably in Greece and has already reached more than 70,000 hectares | About ten villages are surrounded by flames

The fire continues to run out of control in Greece, where forest fires reached more than 70 thousand hectares and the flames divided in two the island of Euboea, the second largest in the land.

“The state is absent. We are in the hands of God. If people leave cities are sure to burn “, Yannis Selimis, a resident of Gouves, in northern Evia, desperately told local media. The inhabitants had to be evacuated.

The 26-year-old added that “In the next 40 years we will have no work and in winter we will drown under water, with no forests to protect us.”

The situation on the island located in the Aegean Sea and about 200 kilometers east of Athens is dire. Evia woke up in a thick cloud of smoke and a rain of ash.

The town of Ellinika is currently surrounded by flames, as firefighters and the few neighbors who have not accepted the order to leave their homes They are trying to save what they can.

Greece, Turkey suffer heat wave

As ANSA reports, locals and tourists gathered on Agios Nikolaos beach, waiting to be evacuated by sea. Meanwhile, flames reached the small town of Vasilika, and a 6-kilometer fire front burned a vast pine forest, approaching the town of Gouves.

Firefighters are trying to stop fires in various places to prevent more homes from being destroyed, after 200 families were left homeless.

But the fire also spread on the continent, in the Peloponnese, at the gates of Athens. Is it so Greece and Turkey endure the worst heat wave in decades, and they’ve been fighting the fires for almost two weeks.

According to AFP, the fire consumed in Greece 70,059 hectares and caused two deaths. Experts relaten high temperatures with climate change.

Firefighters from Ukraine and Romania

Interviewed by Skai TV, the governor of central Greece, Fanis Spanos, said that more 2,500 people stay in hotels and other facilities. In turn, the mayor of Istiaia, Ioannis Kontizias, denounced the absence of firefighting planes on the Evia front.

“We are alone, I have been asking for planes for five days”he protested.

Some 260 Greek firefighters, assisted by a hundred vehicles and supported by more than 200 Ukrainian and Romanian colleagues, are deployed this Sunday in the north of the island, supported by seven planes and helicopters.

The flames also approached houses in the villages of Ellinka, Vasilika and Psaropouli, having destroyed hundreds of houses in the area.