ATHENS, Sept 19 (Askume) – A wildfire roared from the mountains toward Athens last month, stopping at its southernmost tip in a treeless area scorched by fires two years ago. A few miles to the west, however, the blaze found new fuel: forest and brush that had given way to the city’s outskirts.
The route passes through the leafy village of Penteli, where Marlena Kaloudi has lived since the 1970s. The fire also engulfed her home. But what saddened her most was that when she returned, her pine trees, some of them more than 100 years old, had been scorched and turned brown in autumn.
“The biggest disaster … wasn’t our house — it was repairable,” Caroudi said, sitting beside his burned back deck. “These trees were there before us and we hope and pray they’ll be there after us.”
Such destruction is a common sight in Greece and the Mediterranean, where fires have become more frequent and severe as scientists link climate change to rising temperatures and dry conditions.
Data released in August by the National Observatory of Athens, a government-funded research center, showed that 37% of forests and grasslands in the Attica region surrounding Athens had been destroyed by fires since 2017. More than 60% of broadleaf forests and 41% of coniferous forests have burned and have not yet fully regenerated.
The damage increases the risk of flash flooding as rain pours onto barren land that is no longer protected by tree canopies and root systems, and worsens air quality as temperatures rise as shade-less land heats up, four experts said.
It has also sparked debate over what the government response should be: continue programs to replant trees that could provide fuel for future fires, or, as some scientists urge, explore new adaptation plans.
For Caroudi, it was an obvious choice. After the last fire in the city’s northern suburbs, neighbors asked him to cut down the remaining trees in his garden. He refused.
“The loss of this forest scares me,” he said. “I’m worried someone is trying to cut down the remaining trees.”
Plant more trees?
Satellite images show that forest fires have drastically changed Attica’s terrain. Mountainous areas that were forested just a few years ago are now bare and rocky. Areas where forests have regrown are often burned again. Bird songs have disappeared along with the trees.
Data from Global Forest Watch, an initiative that uses satellites to monitor deforestation, shows that 74% of forest loss due to fires in Attica since 2000 occurred after 2017.
Greece is not alone. The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has highlighted the Mediterranean region as a “global climate hotspot” where a 1.5°C rise in surface temperatures above pre-industrial levels could trigger wildfires and increase the risk of drought.
The threat of forest fires is increasing in the United States, Canada, Australia and even rainy Britain. In addition to this threat, there is also debate about what to do with forests after they burn.
Some want to replant trees to restore root systems and recapture lost carbon sinks. Others say forests and fire zones can’t coexist.
Four experts said there was no clear evidence yet which side was right and that local factors would determine which side was best. Still, some say a rethink is needed, especially in areas where the same area has been burned repeatedly.
“There’s no consensus yet that people want to see similar places, but it may not be appropriate for the new fire regime,” said Camille Stevens-Ruhman, an associate professor of fire ecology at Colorado State University.
Greece wants its forests back. With help from 450 million euros from the European Union, the government adopted a national fire prevention plan that includes planting 1 million trees in Attica.
“Increasing and protecting green cover is the goal not only of the government, but of the entire European Union,” said Efstathios Stathopoulos, Greece’s Secretary General for Forestry.
The EU plans to plant 3 billion trees across the bloc by 2030, though the plan is not focused on replanting trees after fires.
Not everyone agrees that reseeding forests after a fire is effective.
Theodore Giannaros, a fire meteorologist at the National Observatory of Athens, inspects a mountain outside Athens that is blackened by last month’s fires.
Next year, the already hot landscape will get even hotter because of the lack of shade, he said. Damage to tree root systems will loosen soil, increasing the risk of flooding or landslides. There will be more dust, he said.
The solution, he said, is to plant non-flammable vegetation instead of trees, such as certain types of grass or field grass.
“We need to think seriously about how to restore landscapes, not just by planting trees and forests, but in a way that makes them more resilient to natural disasters.”
Fernando Pulido, a professor of forestry science at the University of Extremadura in Spain, suggests growing crops or creating other barriers among dense forests in the Mediterranean region.
“It requires a change in mindset … but it’s the only way to guarantee that there won’t be another fire in the same location eight or 10 years from now,” he said.
result
Additionally, areas previously unaffected by the fire were also affected.
Theodoris Arvanitis has been farming organically on a 100-acre plot in a wooded area north of Athens for 35 years. He has a school for aspiring farmers, dormitories for workers and rows of plastic greenhouses for storing fruit and vegetables.
Last month, everything they had built – about €1 million worth of equipment and crops – was destroyed by fire. Now, the metal panels of the charred farmhouse clank in the wind. A row of newly planted fig trees was destroyed; a pile of charred potatoes lay rotting.
Not all the crops were lost, and Avanitis plans to grow them again. On a recent afternoon, workers packed eggplants, green beans and melons for delivery to customers.
But he was having difficulty controlling his emotions as he talked about the fire that was moving through the nearby forests towards his home. Without the help of the fire brigade that day, they had to rely on the help of other residents.
“We were fighting fires everywhere. But new fires were breaking out. For a while, there was nothing we could do. The fire was right outside our farm.”
