A vision of hell: the forest fires in Greece reveal an unlivable future for us

It is like watching a gimmick of a big-budget Hollywood movie, which appeals to our innermost fears with its professionalism to scare us with disasters. Such are the images of the forest fires in Greece, only they show a disaster that is happening here and now. And when we look at these pictures, we can see not only the present, but also the future.


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Photo: AYHAN MEHMET / ANADOLU AGENCY / ANADOLU AGENCY VIA AFP.

War-like scenes show the world the heroic efforts of firefighters on the ground in Greece. Around 900 firefighters are trying to fight the blaze on the island of Evia, which has been raging for ten days now, while winds that change direction unexpectedly often revive fires that have already been extinguished. Hope is hard to keep alive when there is no end in sight to the devastation.

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Photo: AYHAN MEHMET / ANADOLU AGENCY / ANADOLU AGENCY VIA AFP.

Sometimes flames 30 metres high, smoke and ash cover the sky. Tens of thousands of hectares have been burned, hundreds of houses destroyed. Hope has returned to Evia partly because the fire has nothing left to consume. For the first time in several days, they could see the sun through the huge clouds of smoke.

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Photo: ALEXANDROS MICHAILIDIS / SOOC / SOOC VIA AFP.

Eivia is the second largest Greek island after Crete. The island lies near a geological fault line and is occasionally shaken by earthquakes. With beautiful beaches, a pleasant climate, ancient monuments, mountains, pine forests, waterfalls, thermal springs and delicious food, it is a popular destination for tourists and Athenians living nearby. And, of course, an important source of income for the Greek economy.

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Photo: ANGELOS TZORTZINIS / AFP.

For some, the disaster has only interrupted their holidays, for others it has shattered their lives. Still others could not escape the flames. The fire left a lasting impression on the island and its inhabitants.

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Photo: ANGELOS TZORTZINIS / AFP.

On 4 August, 47.1 degrees Celsius was recorded in Greece, where a record-breaking heatwave hit this summer. It is the hottest in 30 years, part of a chain of extreme weather events triggered by climate change - and ultimately by human behaviour, according to the World Meteorological Organization. "The harsh reality of climate change is playing out before our eyes," the organisation's secretary-general made clear. "This is a taste of what lies ahead for future generations. Some of the negative changes are already built into the climate system, but the rest can be managed if we reduce emissions seriously, quickly and sustainably," warned Petteri Taalas.

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Photo: ANGELOS TZORTZINIS / AFP.

It is like we are in a killer spiral: global temperatures are creeping higher and higher, creating more favourable conditions for forest fires, which then push temperatures even higher, setting the stage for more forest fires.

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Photo: HANDOUT / PLANET LABS / AFP

According to the researchers, it is not too much to talk about a chain reaction: the smoke and other by-products of forest fires that are released into the atmosphere can influence weather patterns. There are studies showing that fires can affect cloud formation and reduce precipitation.

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Photo: DIMITRIS LAMPROPOULOS / ANADOLU AGENCY / ANADOLU AGENCY VIA AFP.

Although it has been suggested that the fires were started by arsonists, a disaster of this scale and speed required a long drought and extreme heat.

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Photo: ANGELOS TZORTZINIS / AFP.

Images of the devastation in Greece filled the news just as the sixth report of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC, came out with the alarming conclusion that for decades we have been listening to reports on climate change without taking any serious action, and that we are now at the point where no one is safe. We are on the brink, and very little separates us from hell on earth - which could look something like Greece right now.

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Photo: MARIA CHOURDARI / NURPHOTO / NURPHOTO VIA AFP.

The forest fires in Greece have disrupted stork flights to Africa, which cross the region every year to wait for favourable winds at Cape Sunion to help them cross the Mediterranean. And they passed through the area just as the forests were burning. Some of the storks got lost, injured or died. Locals pick up the dead birds from their lawns.

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Photo: DIMITRIS LAMPROPOULOS / ANADOLU AGENCY / ANADOLU AGENCY VIA AFP.

Greece is not the only place where the sky has been orange with fires recently, with forests burning in northern Macedonia, Albania, Italy, Turkey, Yakutia and California. Many countries are used to summer forest fires, but they are becoming more frequent, more intense and spreading faster.

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Photo: ANGELOS TZORTZINIS / AFP.

The images and videos of the Greek forest fires not only document the disaster, but also illustrate the increasingly collective sense that something is not right: that tornadoes, floods, heatwaves, epidemics have turned the world as we know it upside down. The abstraction of scientific reports is becoming more and more tangible.

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Photo: ANGELOS TZORTZINIS / AFP.

According to a preliminary damage assessment by the Geological Institute of the University of Athens, 90 000 hectares of the country have already been engulfed in flames, of which 51 000 hectares on the second largest island of Evia and 10 000 hectares around the Peloponnese city of Olympia. Almost 600 fires have been recorded in the country in the last nine days.

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Photo: AYHAN MEHMET / ANADOLU AGENCY / ANADOLU AGENCY VIA AFP.

This year was the worst for global forest fires since satellite measurements began in July 2003. Forest and pasture fires caused by extreme heat and prolonged droughts have released 343 megatonnes of carbon dioxide, about a fifth more than the previous global peak in July 2014. Experts predict that the number of large fires hitting Europe will increase and affect increasingly large areas. And in many parts of the world, this year's fire season has not yet peaked.

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