Fires in Turkey. Antalya. Kemer. “The fire was extremely powerful”

Southern Europe is affected by extensive forest and wildland fires. Among other things, it burns Greece, Croatia and Italian Sicily. The fire also appeared in Turkey.

Turkish firefighters fight a fire that broke out near the resort of Kemer. This coastal city is located in the southern part of Antalya province. As the Antalya governor’s office wrote in a statement, the element spread quickly because the country has high air temperatures, strong winds and low humidity.

10 planes, 22 helicopters and over 200 firefighters are involved in extinguishing the fires. “About 120 hectares of forests have burned in the Kemer area,” Tourism Minister Mehmet Nuri Ersoy told reporters.

Antalya Governor Ersin Yazici said local authorities had taken all necessary measures to prevent the fire from spreading to residential areas.

Local authorities said a hospital in Kemer had been evacuated.

On Contact 24 we have received reports from Poles who are staying there. “A hill in Turkey in the area of ​​Antalya, Kemer has been burning since the morning. I am here with my children on vacation. The services are trying to control the situation using planes and helicopters. So far there have been no evacuations from hotels,” wrote Reporter 24 with the nickname AniaWoj.

– The fire looked very serious at first. When we came down from the hotel pier around 9.20 pm local time, nothing was visible. Upon returning, about five minutes later, the fire was extremely powerful, individual trees were clearly visible burning, said Mr. Dominik, who is currently in Goynuk, Antalya province.

Reporter 24 Dominik added that if a travel agency or staff were interested, “it’s hard to talk about any care”. – The only thing we heard was “no problem”, even though they were gathering in groups of several people talking to each other, clearly being nervous – he described the behavior of the hotel crew.

As he said, the problem arose just before midnight, when from the pier you could see the dimming lights along the coast. The electricity supply was also cut off at Mr Dominik’s hotel. – We learned from the staff that the hotels started operating on emergency generators – he said.

Then the situation became dynamic. According to the report, “the sirens of more fire engines could be heard every now and then, and the fire was clearly spreading”. – The access road to Kemer was closed, from where the bus picking us up at 3.30 for one of the trips was supposed to arrive, fortunately around 2 passage has been opened. Among others, the Minister of Tourism of Turkey came to the place. Only at approx. At 5.30, planes and helicopters extinguishing the fire set off, because, according to local authorities, they do not have those that are adapted to extinguish fires at night, reported Reporter 24.

According to the man’s account, until At 3:00 a.m., the fire moved 3.5 kilometers to the west, approaching the forest and moving away from the towns. Preemptively evacuated houses in the vicinity of the fire, as well as a hospital.

– The worst thing about the whole situation is the lack of any contact from the office or resident, despite the fact that we were less than 10 kilometers from the fire and it was clearly visible. Especially now, when there are talks about fires in Greece and the evacuation of tourists, a minimum of information, even a short one – for example, “the situation is being brought under control” – seems to be required by the office – added the angry tourist.

The man added that he had decided to prepare for the evacuation by packing in case of a potential escape order.

– The fire is extinguished until now and it can be seen that it covers a large area, although it seems to be brought under control thanks to the use of aerial extinguishing in the morning – summed up Mr. Dominik.