As Fire Videos Compete With Beach Photos, Greeks Who Rely on Tourism Are Worried

More than 1,500 people were evacuated when a fire broke out on the southeastern tip of Crete, most of them tourists.

When a wildfire spread on the Greek island of Crete this week, Fanouris Vatsinas quickly made arrangements to move dozens of guests from the hotel he owns. Yet he could not bring himself to leave.

“But then,” he said, “the fire reached the hotel, and the firefighters came to get me, too.”

Greece has endured repeated wildfires in recent years and has tried to invest in equipment and workers to prevent or fight them. But the outbreaks keep spreading to new places, hitting the populous mainland and islands. Fires have razed hundreds of thousands of acres of farmland and rattled the tourism industry, with images of burning landscapes competing with idyllic vacation snaps.

The wildfire in Crete began on Wednesday afternoon and burned well into Thursday on the rugged mountains surrounding Ierapetra, a town on the southeast coast of the island. About 1,500 people, mostly tourists, were evacuated. Greece, like much of southern Europe, has been experiencing a heat wave that has created hot and dry conditions. The fire spread quickly once lit, leaping in the wind.

There were no reports of injuries or major damage to property on the island, Greece’s largest and one of its most popular tourist destinations. Because of Crete’s size, the fire posed less risk than those that engulfed smaller islands in recent years. In Evros in northern Greece, a wildfire killed 20 people in 2023, and another in 2018 east of Athens killed 104.

Kathy Kearns, a California native who was visiting the island for the sixth year in a row, said she had shifted her vacation to earlier in the year to avoid the extreme heat and threats of wildfires.

“I was hoping that June would be a safer time, and it’s only July 3,” Ms. Kearns said in a message on Thursday.

Several locals said they had not seen a fire like this in their lifetime. Manolis Lathourakis, whose restaurant took in locals fleeing the fire, said he last saw flames as high in 1986.

“We’ve had hardly any rain for three years and the land was bone-dry,” he said. “It was incredible. The winds were furious.”

More than 200 firefighters worked for hours to douse the blaze from several angles in the sweltering heat, but gale-force winds and the rugged mountain terrain made that difficult, Greece’s fire service spokesman, Vassilis Vathrakoyiannis, told reporters. The fire had been put out by Friday, but the authorities issued warnings for possible wildfires in Crete and elsewhere. Firefighters battled a large blaze east of Athens on Friday afternoon.

Hotel owners like Alexis Tzortzakis worried that the images of the fire would scare off tourists before the height of the summer season. On Friday, already back at the front desk of his hotel, he welcomed back evacuated vacationers but also took cancellations.

“The biggest cost will be if the guests do not come,” Mr. Tzortzakis, who is also the secretary of Ierapetra’s hotelier association, said.

Mr. Vatsinas, the hotelier who tried to protect his business, was not ready to welcome back guests.

“We have no electricity, no water; there’s smoke on the walls,” he said by phone as a helicopter whirred overhead, scanning the landscape for burning embers.

As wildfires have become more prevalent in Greece, officials have invested in new equipment, including a fleet of new fire trucks and aircraft, and have recruited thousands more firefighters. Evacuation drills are carried out nationwide at the start of each fire season.

Officials have also begun fining homeowners who fail to control vegetation in their yards, and courts have handed down heavy sentences for arson. Last month, a 32-year-old housekeeper was sentenced to three years in prison in connection with devastating wildfires that tore across the island of Chios, destroying thousands of acres of land. The fire service believes that a cigarette she tossed aside caused the fire.

But for some, the large swaths of scorched land on Greece’s mainland and its islands show that more could be done.

“Just the sheer expanse of burned land points to a job not well done,” said Alexandros Dimitrakopoulos, the head of the wildland fire laboratory of Aristotle University in Thessaloniki, said in a telephone interview. “You can’t rely on technology — what’s missing is coordination between authorities and training.”

Nikos Vardakis, who owns a boat touring company, joined other Ierapetra business owners who were preparing to reopen after the fire. Mr. Vardakis has lived on the island all his life. While he has never seen a fire quite this large, he dismissed the idea that it would change life on the island.

“It is a problem,” he said, “but it happens in the summer.”

What to Know During Extreme Heat

• Sleeping Tips: Heat can affect both how much you sleep and how good that sleep is. These simple steps can help you get a better night’s rest when it’s hot.
• Medications: Certain antidepressants, blood pressure pills and other drugs make you more susceptible to heat-related illness.
• Heat Acclimatization: It’s possible to train your body to better handle high temperatures in just a few weeks. Here’s how.
• Travel: Stifling conditions could impact your travel plans this summer. Use these tips and precautions to protect yourself and your vacation dollars.