Expert sounds alarm over Attica’s ‘environmental collapse’
An expert in disaster management has voiced concern that successive wildfires and heatwaves will spell the “environmental collapse” of Attica, home to the Greek capital, Athens, as the region continues to battle major wildfires burning through forests, brush, pastureland, residential settlements, farms and businesses.
“The coming heatwave will ‘spark’ new wildfires and I am very afraid that the combination of new blazes and those that have been ongoing in the past few days, will lead to the environmental collapse of Attica,” Efthymios Lekkas, an Athens University professor of geology and disaster management, told Skai TV on Wednesday morning.
“We need help,” he said, adding that existing firefighting forces are not sufficient to prevent the blaze, which is being fanned by strong winds, from reaching the town of more than 23,000 inhabitants.
“If this devastation continues, the entire environmental system will collapse,” Lekkas added, saying that this persistent combination of extreme heat and fire also prevents forests from regenerating.
“If we cannot save our last [natural] resources, we will ultimately experience desertification and end up in a situation like Dubai,” the expert said.
