Vol. 73/No. 37      September 28, 2009

Stuart Gall, a systems engineer living in the town of Marathon, said that about seven fire-fighting planes flew past his neighborhood and dropped their loads of water on the north side of the mountain where the posh neighborhoods Dionysos, Ekali, and Politia are located.

“We kept expecting water to be dropped on the approaching fire. But night time came, the flights were suspended until sunrise, and not one water drop for us!” Gall said. The fire forced Gall and other families to evacuate.

Gall explained that throughout the following day residents extinguished small fires that reignited. Initially they used buckets of water drawn from water mains, until they failed. “Then we used fire extinguishers, bottled water, and shoveled earth over the flames,” Gall said.

Gall said that later in the day a local farmer showed up who had strapped a large water tank to the back of his tractor and connected a hose to it.

Across the street from the luxury villas in Pendeli suburb is a working-class community of more than 100 Iraqi Kurdish refugees living in a camp of containers with no running water or electricity. Makwan Haourami, who lives in the camp, told the Militant that the Kurds helped put out the fire threatening the expensive homes.

The entire Kurdish camp, however, was reduced to ashes. “We asked the fire department to give us one hose to put out the fire but they stood by and did nothing,” he said.

Since the fire Haourami said some of the residents in the wealthy area across the street are collecting signatures on a petition to oust the Kurds, saying that they present a danger to the community. “We are not going anywhere. The government should give us political asylum so we can live like human beings,” said Haourami. He added that a couple of neighbors and a citizens’ rights group in the area donated large tents in which the Kurds are now staying.

Neas Pitulis, a young unemployed chemist, along with his neighbors, fought off a fire with hoses and branches. He said a big difference was made when some construction workers brought a couple of bulldozers from a nearby site. “We were able to build mounds to block the spread of the fire. It was not until much later that the fire department showed up,” Pitulis told the Militant.

Commenting on the extensive damage caused to the forestland around northern Athens, Pitulis said, “It is clear that the decision was made by the authorities to protect real estate property. That is where the fire-fighting force was concentrated. The forests were pretty much abandoned. Society should be able to do both.”

Bobbis Misailides and Natasha Terlexis contributed to this article.  
 
 
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