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And now the Clean Up Begins...

Several Organizations have met and have begun campaigns to assist with the clean up efforts. There are several different options to choose from, reforestation to Humanitarian relief. The Archdiocese, AHEPA, Daughters of Penelope, SAE, Plant Your Roots in Greece, American Hellenic Congress (AHC), Pan Cretan Association, and the Messinians have all rallied their constituents into action. Several of you have posted information as to how you can contribute. Malista will be posting links to this area as more information is received. The cry for assistance has been heard....

The following websites provide links to authorized organizations committed toward relief efforts:

International Orthodox Christian Charities:--http://www.iocc.org

The IOCC is undertaking relief efforts for victims of the fires.  IOCC undertakes its missionary work around the world and is spearheading special relief efforts in Greece.

The Plant Your Roots Foundation--http://www.saeusa.org/content/view/59/64/lang,en

Plant Your Roots Foundation is tackling the enormous challenge of reforestation—the enormity of this task will require substantial assistance.

AHEPA— https://secure.doublematrix.com/ahepaonline-com/contribute.aspx

AHEPA has launched a Emergency Greek Fire Relief Fund that will channel all funds directly to on the scene relief efforts that are underway to assist displaced victims of the fires.

PanCretan Association

PM chairs meeting on recovery of fire-ravaged areas
September 27, 2007

Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis on Tuesday chaired a high-level meeting focusing on planning for the recovery of areas ravaged by August's massive wildfires. According to ministers attending, priority in the coming months will be given to the rebuilding of destroyed homes and farm buildings, protection against flooding and soil erosion and preparing environmental studies for the reconstruction and rehabilitation of the burnt areas.

Taking part in the meeting were the interior, economy, defence, development, environment and agriculture ministers, all of whom will be involved in various aspects of the recovery effort, as well as the head of the newly established solidarity fund for the areas' reconstruction, former foreign minister Petros Molyviatis.
Molyviatis later announced that 149.6 million euros have so far been collected by the fund, which would give priority to the free rebuilding of destroyed homes, as per the prime minister's instructions.

This was confirmed by Environment, Town Planning and Public Works Minister George Souflias, whose ministry will be involved in all areas of reconstruction and rehabilitation, who said that "The state, also via the Solidarity Fund, will provide everything needed to rebuild the houses that have been recorded [as damaged] for free."

"In total there are about 1,100 houses that have been completely destroyed and about 800 that have suffered partial destruction in the Peloponnese, in Evia and Attica," the minister said.

He also noted that the fires had claimed a large number of storage sheds and buildings for other uses, such as stables and sheep pens. According to Molyviatis, these would also be rebuilt for free.

Outlining the results of the meeting, Souflias said there had been an overview of the "several and complex problems involved" and stressed that the government had "a long road ahead of it".

According to Souflias, all the immediate measures that were necessary had been carried out at once but there was still a great deal to do for the implementation of medium-term measures and for the overall economic and environmental reconstruction of the fire-ravaged regions.

Among such medium-term measures, he listed the construction of works to protect against flooding and soil erosion, that were currently underway in all prefectures.

Souflias reported that the government had already begun to carry out environmental studies and reforestation studies and also announced that the army's geographical service would begin taking aerial photographs of the burnt areas on Wednesday, after fixing an earlier malfunction in the relevant systems.
According to the minister, environmental studies could begin once a record of the areas due for reforestation had been made and were expected to be completed by November at the latest. He said these would deal with broader plans that included all the measures needed in order to boost the area's economy and construct necessary infrastructure.

He also stressed that the two major highways destined to be built through the areas will create much better conditions in the future for the region's development.

Noting that achieving the above targets would require a constant effort by all levels of government, Souflias announced that Interior Minister Prokopis Pavlopoulos will be visiting fire-ravaged areas in order to arrange cooperation with prefecture and municipal authorities toward this end.

SPECIAL MEETINGS REGARDING
ASSISTANCE TO GREEK FIRE VICTIMS

New York - This week, His Eminence Archbishop Demetrios of America extended, to the heads of the major Greek American organizations, an invitation to a special meeting at the Archdiocese on September 24th so that each would have the opportunity to share with the members gathered what their respective associations are doing with regards to the disaster in Greece.   While the Archdiocese has been at the forefront of the national effort to raise awareness and assistance for the people affected by the catastrophic fires, many groups have also undertaken their own endeavors.  His Eminence felt it would be most helpful for these groups to meet and coordinate their efforts to better meet the needs of the victims.

On Thursday, September 20th, the Archbishop has been invited to a gathering in Washington DC organized by USAID of select guests and corporate participants of the BCLC (Business Civic Leadership Center) Corporate Citizenship Conference to discuss amongst other concerns,  reconstruction efforts in the wildfire-affected areas in Greece.  USAID is interested in fostering public-private alliances targeting reforestation and livelihood restoration and linking the private sector, the environmental NGOs and the Greek American community.  The Archdiocese will play a critical and major role in offering whatever assistance is sent to the victims of the fires in Greece by Greek Americans. His Eminence has asked His Grace Bishop Andonios, Coordinator of the Archdiocesan Greek Fire Relief Fund, to represent the Archbishop at this meeting.

Greece is Burning, Declares State of Emergency...

Detroiter's woke to news of fires burning across Greece. Antenna, and Mega, were providing indepth coverage, as eyewitnesses reported the devastation. Running from from the blazes, tourists and villagers scrambled to beat the sheets of fire pounding through the forests, dried by days of heat. Over 170 fires set simultaneously throughout the country have left Greece at the mercy of nature.

Malista has gathered several articles from different publicationsGreece declared a national state of emergency on Saturday as scores of forest fires that have killed at least 46 people continued to burn out of control, leaving some villages trapped within walls of flames, cut off from firefighters and, in some cases, from firefighting aircraft grounded because of high winds.

Most fires have been on the Peloponnesian Peninsula.

WASHINGTON (August 27, 2007)—Karen Stamatiades, grand president, Daughters of Penelope, has issued the following statement on the forest fires that have spread through southern Greece:

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the citizens of the Hellenic Republic who have lost loved ones or have lost their homes to the devastating fires that have blazed through southern Greece.  We offer our concern and empathize with the Hellenic Republic.

“We also praise the courageous forestry service firefighters and Greek soldiers who are putting their lives on the line to tame and extinguish the fires.  Moreover, we appreciate all the countries that have provided assistance to the Greek government in this time of great need.  We hope that all of their combined efforts will spare further widespread damage and destruction, especially as the fires approach ancient Olympia.

“Finally, we hope that those individuals responsible for the fires are brought to justice.”

The Daughters of Penelope District Governor for Greece is from Sparta.  Stamatiades hopes to be in contact with her today to assess how families are affected in the area.

The Daughters of Penelope is a leading international women’s Hellenic organization.  For more information about the Daughters of Penelope, please visit www.ahepa.org/dop.

New York Times - Orestis Panagiotou/European Pressphoto Agency
The charred wreckage of cars today in the Peloponnesian peninsula.

Desperate people called television and radio stations pleading for help that they feared would not arrive in time.

“I can hear the flames outside my door,” one caller from the village of Andritsena told a Greek television station, according to Reuters news service. “There is no water anywhere. A burned firetruck and Burned cars could be seen in the Greek village of Artemida

There is no help. We are alone.”

Although most of the fires have been on the Peloponnesian Peninsula, some broke out on the outskirts of Athens on Saturday, forcing the evacuation of homes and a monastery and closing a major road linking the capital to the main airport for several hours. The national fire brigade said that by evening it had brought those blazes under control, including one that came within about six miles of the city.

The government response to the fires, Greece’s worst in decades, is leading to renewed criticism of Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis less than a month before parliamentary elections. Mr. Karamanlis had already been heavily criticized for his government’s handling of fires earlier this summer.

The country has been vulnerable to fire this summer because of drought and three consecutive heat waves that sent temperatures soaring over 100 degrees. More than 3,000 forest fires have razed thousands of acres of wooded areas since June; the earlier fires killed nine people.

The latest spate of fires on the peninsula started Friday. Strong, hot winds have spread the flames.

“The situation is unbelievable,” said Yiannis Stamoulis, a spokesman for the Greek Fire Brigade. “We’re dealing with savage forces of nature and it’s humanly impossible to effectively take them on, however strong and well prepared we may be.”

He added, “We’re fighting an asymmetrical war.”

Firefighters expect the death toll to rise, because they have not yet been able to search some areas that had been overrun by flames.

Hardest hit by the fires were a dozen hamlets tucked into the rural highlands around the town of Zaharo in the western peninsula, where at least 12 people, including some who may have been trying to flee by car, were killed.

Charred bodies were found in cars, houses and fields in areas around Zaharo, firefighters said.

At least some of the people there were believed to have been killed or trapped after a collision between a fire truck and a convoy of cars apparently trying to flee the flames.

Scores of other residents, including elderly and disabled people, remained trapped in their homes, phoning in to local television and radio stations, crying for help.

“Help! Help! Help!” wailed one resident as he spoke with Mega television from the town of Artemida. “Get some one here fast. We’re losing everything.”

Minutes later, another caller pleaded for authorities to help save her two children, one of whom she feared was in shock after having seen their home go up in flames.

South of Zaharo, rescue teams confirmed at least six deaths in the seaside town of Areopolis, in the Mani region, a popular tourist destination known for its rugged cliffs and ravines.

Among the victims in the area were a pair of French hikers who were trapped in a flaming ravine. Their charred bodies were found locked in an embrace, the authorities said.

Hotels and dozens of surrounding villages have been evacuated.

With national elections set for Sept. 16, Mr. Karamanlis suspended campaigning over the weekend to oversee the national response to the fires.

Late Saturday, Mr. Karamanlis appeared on national television and declared that he was mobilizing all of the country’s resources to tackle the blazes to “prevail in a battle that must be won.” Mr. Karamanlis also suggested that the recent fires might have been purposely set. “So many fires sparked simultaneously in so many regions is no coincidence,” he said, wearing a black tie and suit in a show of mourning. “We will get to the bottom of this and punish those responsible.”

But political opponents accused the prime minister of shunning responsibility for what the authorities have called a “national tragedy.”

“Rather than deflect attention and lay blame on some anonymous arsonist, the prime minister should take blame for the government’s failure to effectively handle this crisis,” said Nikos Bistis, a opposition socialist lawmaker, on local television.

The overstretched national fire services are being helped by an estimated 6,000 soldiers mobilized for the operation. The national teams take control of forest fires from community brigades.

A fleet of water-dumping aircraft was expected from France, Germany and Norway, after Greece appealed to the European Union for “urgent assistance.”

Death toll mounts in Greek fires

The speed with which the fire spread caught many people unawares
Greek emergency workers continue to find the charred bodies of people burned to death by forest fires that are raging in the south of the country. Officials raised the death toll from the fires over the past two days to 46.

Searches of burnt cars, houses and fields were still turning up the remains of those who could not escape.

Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis called the situation "an unspeakable tragedy". The government appealed for EU help and later declared a state of emergency.

Greek newspapers are calling the southern Peloponnese region a "crematorium", says the BBC's Malcolm Brabant in Athens.

The fires have been moving so fast that people have been cut off before they could escape. With emergency services overstretched, desperate residents and local officials called television and radio stations to appeal for help.

"We are living through an unspeakable tragedy today." Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis

Witnesses tell of fire horror

Some of the worst fires are concentrated along an 80km (50 mile) stretch on the west coast of the Peloponnese to Mani in the very south of the peninsula. But others are burning across the country.

Two new fires broke out near Athens, forcing a road between the city and its airport to be closed. A monastery and homes were evacuated as flames closed in on the capital. Arson was suspected in several cases, with 20 new fires starting during the night, a fire department spokesman said.

All top football matches were postponed on the opening weekend of the season

France responded to Greece's appeal for help, sending two water-dropping planes, which were scheduled to arrive on Saturday afternoon, AFP reported.

Family found

At least nine people are reported to have burnt to death in their cars as they attempted to flee the flames near the town of Zaharo, west of the Peloponnese. The Associated Press reported that a car had crashed into a fire engine, causing a traffic jam from which people could not escape as the flames advanced.

Zaharo seemed to be the centre of the disaster. Fire crews said they had found at least 30 bodies in villages near the town, as they searched burned out cars and houses.

"It's a tragedy," an eyewitness told Greek television. "I can see the burnt bodies of a mother holding her child in her arms. Further away there are more bodies. It's terrible."

Fire officials confirmed that a mother and her four children had perished, as had three firefighters.

A local prefect close to the scene described it as horrific.

"The situation is extremely dire... The speed with which this fire has been spreading is astonishing," said the mayor of Zaharo, Pantazis Chronopoulos.

Six deaths were confirmed in the seaside town of Areopolis in the Mani region of Greece's deep south. Hotels and several villages have been evacuated, fire officials said.

'Incredible efforts'

But hot, dry winds were expected to continue through Saturday, gusting up to gale force and fanning the flames.

The winds hampered the use of fire-fighting planes, though some helicopters have managed to take flight.

Fires have consumed hillsides in Taygetos, in southern Greece

"The helicopters are operating whenever the weather conditions permit... The pilots are making incredible efforts," fire department spokesman Nikos Diamandis said.

The overstretched fire services are being helped by the military, but our correspondent says troops do not seem trained or equipped for the task, and are no match for the intense flames.

A hot, dry summer, with temperatures recently touching 40C (104F) has left much of the country vulnerable. On the island of Evia, north of the capital, three villages were evacuated as a fire approached.

"If we don't stop this now there will be nothing left," said Sofia Moutsou, mayor of the town of Styra.

Friday and Saturday have been the deadliest days of a terrible summer spent battling forest fires, transforming what had previously been seen as predominantly an ecological disaster into a human one, our correspondent says.

There has been widespread public anger at the government's response, which many have criticised as inadequate and slow.

Prime Minister Karamanlis visited Zaharo late on Friday, and was to chair an emergency meeting in Athens on Saturday.

He is under considerable political pressure, as he faces an early general election in three weeks' time.

Sixteen dead in worst day of forest fires
Emergency declared in Peloponnese

Residents of Zacharo, in the western Peloponnese, flee from the advancing flames of a massive fire that caused at least 10 deaths in the area yesterday. Some 200 fires were reported to have broken out across the country yesterday.

At least 16 people were reported to have died by last night as huge forest fires, fanned by gale-force winds, raged out of control in the Peloponnese and other parts of the country, burning thousands of hectares of land and destroying homes. It was the single most fatal day in a summer marked by thousands of forest fires that have now claimed 27 lives.

The worst fire was in the area of Zacharo, in the western Peloponnese, where 10 deaths were reported.

Another six people, including two French tourists, were found dead near a hotel in Areopolis on the Mani peninsula where a fierce blaze burnt large tracts of land. A firefighter also died of a heart attack after inhaling fumes during attempts to extinguish the blaze. Local houses suffered limited damage chiefly because most are built of stone.

A state of emergency was declared in Laconia and Messinia where several blazes were under way, the worst on the slopes of Mount Taygetos, one of the most inaccessible parts of the country. «If the winds don't abate, so that firefighting aircraft can start flying, then the destruction will be massive,» Messinia Prefect Dimitris Drakos said.

Public Order Minister Vyron Polydoras said the government was using all its resources to control the fires. «The firefighting effort is covering a broad front - all ground forces are engaged and we are trying our best to get helicopters to the sites too,» he said.

Some 200 fires were reported across the country yesterday. Apart from the Peloponnese, the most serious were in Kastoria, Ioannina, Arta and Attica.

A fire that broke out near the oil refinery in Elefsina was extinguished before it could approach fuel tanks.

«The situation is truly dramatic, every minute another fire is breaking out somewhere,» senior fire service officer Nikos Diamantis said yesterday afternoon.

Following news of the destruction and loss of life, political leaders were forced to change their plans for election campaigning.

Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis, who had been due to tour northwestern Greece this weekend, interrupted his campaign trail to visit areas in the Peloponnese hit by the fires, his office said.

Main opposition PASOK leader George Papandreou, in Serres, said he was suspending his party's election campaign to visit fire-ravaged areas too. «Today is a tragic day - we feel the pain of our fellow citizens who are despairing, insecure and scared,» he said.

President Karolos Papoulias expressed his condolences to the families of the victims. «These are days of national mourning. Let us do what is necessary so they won't be repeated,» he said.

“The next few hours will be critical”

Forest fires whipped by gale-force winds killed at least 15 people in southern Greece Friday, including at least nine people trapped in their cars as the flames approached.

Across the country, more than 150 fires were burning, and the government appealed to the European Union to 'send any help they can,' acting Interior Minister Spyros Flogaitis said after an emergency meeting of Greece's civil protection department.

Hot, dry winds gusting to gale force prevented firefighting planes from taking off, leaving only ground forces to fight the flames in the southern Peloponnese, with occasional help from helicopters and residents using their garden hoses. A three-day heat wave, with temperatures up to 104 degrees, has left forests and scrubland parched on the peninsula linked to the Greek mainland by a narrow isthmus.

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THRASY PETROPOULOS

Residents of Mt Pendeli suburbs run away from a forest fire (L) which burned several houses (R) on August 16

MOUNT Pendeli, largely untouched by the forest fires that have ravaged mountainous areas of Greece this summer, took its turn to burn again on August 16.

Fanned by gale force winds, the flames - which are believed to have started in four separate locations simultaneously - destroyed 10 houses and threatened dozens more residences in northern Athenian suburbs.

Representatives of the fire services, meanwhile, once again found themselves answering to criticism of their slow response that allowed the flames, which broke out shortly before 10.30am, to burn uncontrolled well into the afternoon and to enter residential areas.

However, fire services spokesman Nikolaos Damantis explained that the firefighting efforts were hampered by strong winds.

Though more than 150 firefighters, 79 vehicles, 10 aircraft and nine helicopters were eventually deployed, the water-scooping aircraft remained grounded for 90 crucial minutes while the flames formed a front of several kilometres.

Panicked residents of the suburbs of Kifissia, New and Old Pendeli, Melissia and Vrilissia were seen trying to control flames with garden hoses. The resulting smoke could be seen across Athens, while ash from the flames travelled as far away as the southern suburbs.

"This is a huge catastrophe," Melissia Mayor Manolis Grafakos said. "There are no words to describe it. A large chunk of the forest has gone, houses have burned, and I do not think we are fully aware of the damage."

His counterpart in Pendeli, Dimitris Stergiou, was equally graphic. "At least 10 houses in [neighbouring] New Pendeli have burned, and I saw many houses under threat," he said. "Firefighters were entering flames to try to save people with considerable risk to their own lives. During the crucial first minutes of the blaze, I was screaming for aerial firefighting assistance."

As many as 10 people were reportedly taken to hospital with breathing problems, and power cuts affected much of the wider area, including central Athens. About 130 patients from a nearby psychiatric clinic were evacuated.

"Because of the high winds - which were of eight Beaufort and even nine in places - the fire spread quickly, creating a micro-climate that further fanned the flames," explained fire services spokesman Damantis.

"Therefore, in addition to being impaired by the thick smoke, the service's firefighting means were grounded between 11am and 12.30pm when it was impossible for aircraft to gather water [in the Marathon area] and tackle the fires. The situation is very difficult. There is damage to homes."

He added that the fires were believed to have started in four separate locations simultaneously - and that he had been made aware of a fifth, more recent blaze, starting in an area known as the Daveli Cave moments before the press conference - prompting strong suspicions of arson.

Though Pendeli, one of four mountains that contain Athens' urban sprawl, has lost 10,000 hectares of land in three catastrophic fires since 1982, Damantis stressed that the fire services' priority was to protect human life and stop the fire from entering residential areas.

The fire services' efforts to control the flames were also hampered by Public Power Corporation pylons and cables. Eyewitnesses reported seeing the electrical connections of several pylons explode in the heat, creating localised fires of their own. Added to that, aircraft and helicopters needed to ensure that power to the cables had been cut before releasing their waterload.

Pendeli Mayor Stergiou said that he repeatedly warned of an impending large-scale fire on the mountain when isolated blazes were reported over the past week.

On August 3 he told the Athens News that land on the mountain, which was once lush pine forest, was now selling for more than a million euros a stremma (a tenth of a hectare), fuelling the temptation of people - including some connected to what he called the "state mechanism" - to start fires with the intention of gaining permission to develop the burnt land.

He claimed that 22 building co-operatives, one made up of employees of the Bank of Greece and another by a set of journalists working for the daily newspaper Ethnos, were behind the operation.

With forests displaying tinderbox condition after successive heatwaves and scant rainfall, Greece has had a catastrophic summer for forest fires, most notably this past June when 5,600 hectares of forestland - 2,000 of them containing fir trees - were destroyed.

ATHENS NEWS , 17/08/2007, page: A02
Article code: C13248A021

AHEPA Feels Sorrow, Pain for Greece
Will mobilize its chapters and solicit assistance for Greek citizens
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Statement by AHEPA International President Ike Gulas
about the devastating fires that have spread across Greece:

"We have all witnessed the incredible images of the damaging forest fires that have ravaged southern Greece.

"Currently, we are making inquiries to the government of the Hellenic Republic to explore how we can offer our resources to help the people of Greece. Also, we will outreach to the United States government and to local domestic agencies to see if we can encourage or sponsor their participation."

The AHEPA emergency response team has been asked to mobilize the chapters in an effort to assemble care packages to be sent to the victims of this terrible environmental disaster, and additional implementations will be forthcoming.

Supreme President Ike Gulas, on behalf of the entire AHEPA family empathizes with the citizens of Greece. "Our thoughts and prayers are with those families who have lost loved ones or their possessions due to this tragic event. We commend the valiant efforts of the brave forestry service firefighters and Greek soldiers who are battling these historic fires, protecting the citizens, Greece's history and her antiquities.

"Moreover, we are grateful to Austria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Israel, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland, and to all nations who continue answering Prime Minister Karamanlis's call for international assistance by providing water-dropping aircraft.

"Finally, we hope that the individuals responsible for these deplorable acts are apprehended and brought to justice."

The American Hellenic Educational Progressive Association (AHEPA), is the leading organization of the nation's 1.3 million American citizens of Greek heritage.

AHEPA is the largest Greek-American association in the world with chapters in the United States, Canada, Greece, Cyprus, and sister chapters in Australia and New Zealand. It was established in 1922 by visionary Greek Americans to protect Hellenes from prejudice originating from the KKK, and in its history, AHEPA joined with the NAACP and B'nai B'rith to fight discrimination.

The mission of the AHEPA family is to promote the ideals of Hellenism, education, philanthropy, civic responsibility and family and individual excellence.

The AHEPA family consists of four organizations: AHEPA, Daughters of Penelope, Sons of Pericles and Maids of Athena.

For more information about the AHEPA family, or how to join, please contact AHEPA Headquarters, 202.232.6300, or visit <http://www.ahepa.org/joinahepa> www.ahepa.org.