Zoom Image
Greece: Converted Leopard tank in action
Photo: Thanassis Stavrakis / AP / dpa
For the eleventh day in a row, the fire brigade is fighting the major forest fires in northeastern Greece. According to the authorities, 475 firefighters were deployed on Tuesday – including six firefighting planes and four helicopters.
In addition, a special vehicle was transported from central Greece to the region, as the news channel Skai showed: a Leopard tank converted for extinguishing with a capacity for 15,000 liters of extinguishing water, a shovel for rough terrain and a rescue chamber for ten people. The special vehicle should be able to shoot the extinguishing water up to 80 meters.
According to the information, moderate winds continued to blow in the region on Tuesday, which rekindled the flames in many places. Meanwhile, according to the news channel ERTNews, the compensation process for affected residents has begun.
It also continues to burn on the Parnitha mountain range northwest of Athens and on the islands of Andros and Euboea. An emergency meeting with Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis is scheduled to discuss firefighting and reforestation in the region later today. The handling of the severe fires will also be discussed in the Greek parliament next Thursday.
For many parts of Greece, the risk of forest fires continued to be "high" on Tuesday by the Civil Protection, including large parts of the Peloponnese peninsula, the Attica region around the capital Athens, the Cyclades islands and Crete. The fire brigade as well as the police and military patrolled the affected areas on the ground and from the air in order to detect new sources of fire as early as possible, as the daily newspaper »Kathimerini« reported.
wit/dpa