A roaring blaze raced toward a Turkish thermal power plant Tuesday and farmers herded panicked cattle toward the sea as wildfires that have killed eight people raged on for a seventh day.
The nation of 84 million has been transfixed in horror as the most destructive wildfires in generations erase pristine forests and rich farmland across swaths of Turkey’s Mediterranean and Aegean coasts.
Frightened tourists have been forced to scamper onto boats for safety and dozens of villages have been evacuated as wild winds and soaring heat spread the flames. An AFP team in the Aegean city of Marmaris saw farmers pulling their screaming animals out of burning barns and pulling them to the relative safety of the beach.
Officials in neighbouring Greece have blamed two smaller fires on the island of Rhodes and the Peloponnese peninsula on a record heatwave they link to climate change. Temperature in excess of 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Farenheit) across the south of Turkey also set off a record surge in electricity use that caused power outages Monday in cities such as Ankara and Istanbul.
Turkey’s energy ministry blamed the outages on drought-like conditions that have emptied dams responsible for hydropower production and a “record level” in electricity use in the heat.
Turkey’s defence and interior ministers said they were also mobilising their forces to help the firefighters.
The police said they intended to use water spraying tanks of the type used to dispurse unsanctioned demonstrations and rallies. But the Milas mayor said his earlier appeals for help from firefighting planes have gone unanswered. It was obvious that this would happen,” he tweeted as the fire neared the power plant. “I am going to cry in anger.
In other news – Last moments before Shona Ferguson died at a hospital
On Friday, though doctors had prepared film producer and actress Connie Ferguson for the worst as her husband’s condition did not show any improvement, nothing could have prepared The Queen lead actress for the final moment.
Surrounded by her close friends who have been praying with her and offering her words of encouragement as Covid-19 hit her family hard this year, Connie lost her world when her husband, Shona Ferguson, died on Friday at Milpark Hospital from Covid-19 complication. Learn more
Source: guardian
