Firefighters fought Monday, following wildfires near three separate tourist attractions in Türkiye, Greece and Albania, near a tourist attraction in Albania after scorching weather throughout the Mediterranean.
Smoke on the mountain in Karabuk, 200 kilometers north of the capital Ankara, was a wildfire that lasted for the sixth day, forcing the evacuation of more than a dozen villages and burnt forests.
Türkiye’s Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry said on Monday that in the northwestern Bursa province, three firefighters were killed during a crash on Sunday. More than 3,600 people were evacuated in settlements in Mersins and southern Antalya provinces on Monday, where two fires were attacked there on Monday.
Türkiye has suffered dozens of wildfires in recent weeks as temperatures soared, with 10 firefighters killed last week in fighting the fires in the central Eskisehir province.
Hot and dry summers are common in the Mediterranean, but in recent years, more intense heat waves have caused devastating wildfires due to the rapidly rising global temperatures.
The fire brigade said Monday afternoon that at least 44 wildfires broke out in Greece in the past 24 hours.
Strong winds have reignited the fire since Saturday on the island of Kythera in southern Greece. In Athens, firefighters quickly broke out in a densely populated suburb at the foot of Hymettus Mountain near the university campus.
Several Greek villages were evacuated last weekend and five people were injured in separate wildfires.
When Greece saw its third summer heat wave on Monday, rainy days in Serbia helped firefighters there bring more than 100 wildfires.
In Albania, more than 900 firefighters assisted by the army have been in the fight to control wildfires before reaching Saranda, the seafront and other tourist attractions in the southern southern Ionian coast.
Police said about 13 people have been arrested for arson-related offences in the past three days.
Bulgaria, with the assistance of several European countries, deployed firefighting aircraft to help tame large wildfires near the Bulgaria-Türkiye border.
So far, the flame has coketed a total of nearly 6,500 hectares. According to local media, the two were detained by authorities and investigated the cause of the fire.
Some scientists say more research is needed on which toxic chemicals may be re-launched into the air, as climate change makes a type of wetland that naturally stores more prone to fire.
