As fire season fast approaches, Greece’s planners look for an edge in response time
Volunteers and firefighters race to pull them to safety through clouds of red smoke, as a drone buzzing overhead sends live video of the rescue to a national coordination center.
Members of the baptism party are played by actors hired for the day by the Fire Service and the regional authority, and smoke flares are used to mimic fire conditions.
The exercise held Thursday and multiple drills planned this month have taken on added urgency ahead of the fire season that officially starts May 1.
Temperatures touched 30 degrees Celsius (86 Fahrenheit) in late March and large wildfires are already breaking out weeks earlier than expected.
“Due to climate, conditions have changed. Everything in nature is dry now and it’s very easy to catch fire. So we have to be ready to deal with it,” said Loukia Kefalogianni, the deputy regional government of the capital’s North Attica region.
To cope with the crisis, Greece is fast-tracking a 2.1 billion euro ($2.3 billion) program to upgrade its fleet of water tankers and create an artificial intelligence-driven sensor network to detect smoke in the early stages of a fire.
