Patients evacuated onto ferry as wildfire rages near hospital in Greece

By Alexandros Avramidis

ALEXANDROUPOLIS, Greece (Reuters) -Dozens of hospital patients, including newborn babies, were evacuated onto a ferry in the Greek port city of Alexandroupolis on Tuesday as a wildfire raged uncontrolled for a fourth day, and two new blazes broke out near Athens, the fire brigade said.

Hundreds of firefighters have been struggling to contain the blaze that broke out near Alexandroupolis on Saturday and quickly spread, fanned by gale force winds, sending plumes of smoke above the city and turning the night sky red. One person has been killed.

On the foothills of Mount Parnitha on the outskirts of Athens, a wildfire that broke out on Tuesday was threatening homes and an operation was underway to evacuate nuns from Kleiston Monastery, the fire brigade said.

Another blaze burned uncontrolled in the industrial town of Aspropyrgos. More than 120 firefighters and nine aircraft were fighting the blazes near Athens, the fire brigade said.

Authorities said 65 patients at the University Hospital of Alexandroupolis had been evacuated by early Tuesday as a precaution onto a ferry in the port.

"I've been working for 27 years, I've never seen anything like this," said nurse Nikos Gioktsidis. "Stretchers everywhere, patients here, IV drips there ... it was like a war, like a bomb had exploded.

Fourteen more people were evacuated by a coastguard vessel from a beach near the village of Makri.

Overnight, as flames approached another clinic at the premises of the Alexandroupolis Metropolitan Church Foundation, staff carried a man on a wheelchair to an ambulance, while others were evacuated on stretchers.

A ferry was turned into a makeshift hospital. Elderly patients lay on mattresses on the cafeteria floor, paramedics attended to others on stretchers and a woman held a man resting on a sofa, an IV drip attached to his hand.

The ferry later sailed to the nearby port of Kavala, state broadcaster ERT said.

COMMUNITIES EVACUATED

Father Christodoulos Karathanasis, director of the Holy Metropolis of Alexandroupolis, said 200 patients from both facilities had been evacuated in just over four hours.

"Some were able to walk and others were bedridden," he said.

Fire brigade spokesperson Ioannis Artopios said: "Under extreme weather conditions, mainly due to gale force winds, a huge effort has been made to manage fire fronts that broke out simultaneously in many parts of the country.

"The hours we are going through are extremely critical."

Fifty-six firefighters arrived in Greece from Romania on Tuesday and Athens was expecting further assistance from the Czech Republic, Croatia, Germany and Sweden with 64 more firefighters, 19 fire engines, seven planes and one helicopter, the fire brigade said.

Several communities in the broader Evros region, near the border with Turkey, have been evacuated as authorities warned the risk of new fires remained high in the coming days.

"It has reached the entire village," said Alexandros Chrisoulidis, a 19-year-old resident of Avanta village. "Our own house up there, where the fire started, has completely burned down. There is nothing," he said.

A 23-year-old resident who gave his name as Nikos, said: "The situation is tragic. All that is needed right now are prayers and rain."

The burned body of a man believed to be a migrant was found in a rural area in Lefkimi, near Alexandroupolis, on Monday, a local police official told Reuters.

Evros is a popular border crossing for hundreds of migrants from the Middle East and Asia who use the river separating Greece from Turkey to cross into the European Union.

Summer wildfires in Greece are common but have been made worse in recent years by unusually hot, dry and windy conditions that scientists have linked to climate change.

More than 20,000 foreign tourists had to be evacuated from the holiday island of Rhodes in July as wildfires burned for a week, destroying hotels and resorts.

In Greece's northern seaside city of Kavala, two firefighters were hurt on Monday while trying to contain a blaze threatening homes in the village of Dialekto, the fire brigade said.

(Additional reporting by Karolina Tagaris and Lefteris Papadimas in Athens; Writing by Karolina Tagaris; Editing by Angus MacSwan and Janet Lawrence)