Wildfires in Greece burn for fifth day as another heatwave hits
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00:00 the very latest. Let's speak with our correspondent in Greece, Natalie Savarikas.
00:04 Natalie, another heatwave moving in there. The Prime Minister warning that more is to come.
00:11 How are people coping with this extreme heat?
00:14 Well, I can tell you with temperatures soaring at 45 degrees Celsius and peaking in mainland
00:22 Greece and the region of Thessaly, it becomes all the more challenging in big cities where
00:26 concrete only magnifies the heat. Now, I can tell you, AC is the usual go-to, but also lots of water
00:35 and the public sector employees have been given guidelines to essentially work from home,
00:40 especially vulnerable groups. But that might not be the case for everyone who may not have
00:45 air conditioning at home or fans or may not find it good enough for them. So that might force many
00:51 people to actually just show up at the office and enjoy the coolness of the air conditioning there.
00:58 Lots of water, of course, light clothing such as I'm wearing. And as the weekend is approaching,
01:04 many Greeks are just preferring to try and hit the beach or escape to islands like where I am,
01:10 or a mountainous region that helps a lot with the coping mechanism. But even there, I can tell you,
01:16 it becomes pretty untenable, especially around lunchtime, noon, up to five o'clock in the
01:22 afternoon. And meteorologists are indeed warning that winds will be picking up and that will just
01:28 increase the likelihood of fires just raging out of control, as we've seen the past few days.
01:33 And Natalie, you are in one of the higher risk mountainous regions. So what are firefighters
01:39 telling you there about the possibility of further wildfires?
01:44 Well, so far here in Kythira, the situation has been pretty calm. There've been no fires. But in
01:50 the Peloponnese, which is close by, the situation is quite different. Laconia so far, the firefighters
01:58 have been telling me that the picture looks pretty contained, but they have a very contained sense
02:04 of optimism, especially when it goes for the island of Rhodes or the River Nucoria close to Athens.
02:11 This morning, they deployed their aircraft, dozens of them, to kind of tame the fire. They
02:17 managed to achieve a lot of work throughout the night. But their main concern and worry
02:22 is, of course, the extreme heat combined with winds fanning those flames. They said the help
02:28 that they've received from the European Union counterparts, namely aircraft from Italy,
02:33 from France, and even crews from Romania, Poland, Slovakia, and Israel is also deploying some
02:40 aircraft to help, has been indeed quite helpful. But they're on guard, especially for the weekend
02:46 and Sunday, where the temperatures are set to reach their highest point at 45 degrees Celsius.
02:53 But also the winds will pick up six on the Beaufort scale. So that is really a recipe
02:58 pretty much for disaster. So they're all bracing for this weekend to try and contain the fire
03:03 situation, which has devastated thousands of acres of untamed forest, destroyed homes, and killed so
03:11 many animals. Stay cool there if you can, Natalie. That is Natalie Savarikas joining us with the very
03:17 latest from Greece.