Greece’s bread heart is hurt
Dear Member,
This is our weekly round-up from Greece.
The situation in Thessaly Plain and surrounding areas is desperate. Lost lives, homes, and animals in the mud predict nothing but a grim next decade for these people and for the country as a whole, as the plain represents some 5.2% of the country’s GDP - in agriculture, forestry, and fisheries.
The road and rail network has been crippled. Even army bases flooded, raising questions about whether top army officers could protect the national defense.
Even worse is that the disaster could have been avoided. It has been predicted with great accuracy. But then, anti-flooding works were never implemented. This, along with government incompetence, did the job.
The next day will be really hard. How many disasters can this country take?
What happened in Thessaly?
How many died? How many are missing?
More than a week after the disastrous flooding in Thessaly Plain, caused by Storm Daniel, there are no satisfactory answers to these questions.
Officially, until now, there are 17 dead (Öffnet in neuem Fenster), including an Austrian couple (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) who went missing in Pelion, where they had traveled to get married.
Officially, there is only one missing person, a Pakistan national working in the fields.
How can only one person be missing since whole villages were covered under water (which has not been drained yet)? According to Greek media, the rescue team’s work has not retracted any dead people who were not reported as missing. Authorities claimed that if people were still missing, their loved ones or neighbors would have reported it.
“What nobody can safely estimate is the number of migrant workers who are doing agricultural work in the Thessaly plain, as they were staying in shanties and makeshift lodgings, and it is possible the strong rain trend carried them away,”
Kathimerini reported (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) on 10 September. KEERFA Anti-Racist Movement reported (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) on 11 September that at least eight migrant workers were missing.
The water is reportedly receding slowly in the villages of Karditsa, Trikala, Palamas, Farkadonas, Domokos, and Farsala.
The Fire Brigade and the Army are still operating in the area. However, reports have revealed chaos in how the government has managed the disaster aftermath.
A TV reporter tried to discern (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) who was responsible for disposing of carcasses due to the floods. She ultimately revealed chaos: one authority pointed to the other as responsible. She concluded that the authorities were absent, and this extremely risky (for one’s health) task was coming down to the flood victims. It was only on Thursday that it was announced that the Army would do (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) the job. (It was not specified by the Army generally. Even the drafted soldiers who are not trained for that?) It is estimated that more than 110,000 animals died in the floods.
The water problem is still tremendous in many areas of Karditsa, Larisa, and Volos, as it has been diagnosed as non-drinkable.
The road network seems to be gradually restored. However, Athens-Thessaloniki National Road remained closed until Friday afternoon, as it was still underwater at its Thessaly part. On Friday, Infrastructure Minister Staikouras “estimated (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)” that the road might reopen on Saturday, 16/9, for its Athens-Thessaloniki lanes and Sunday, 17/9, for the Thessaloniki-Athens lanes. Seasonal firefighters posted this video (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) depicting the flooded National Road. They commented that these are “unacceptable images if we assume many billions have been handed out supposedly for anti-flooding works.”
The train network (already obsolete, with huge safety problems as the Tempi accident proved) also faces immense infrastructure problems anew. The floods came shortly after the long-awaited tele-administration system had been delivered, and basic operational systems were damaged. “We will need quite a few months to make the railway as it was 15 days ago,” Staikouras stated.
Moreover, Documento newspaper revealed (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) pictures of military helicopters flooded in Stefanovikio air base, Central Greece. Dozens of helicopters from the 1st Army Air Force Brigade could not fly for Search & Rescue as they were stuck on the ground due to the flooding of the airbase, according to the report. The helicopters were Huey, Apache, and Kiowa Warrior. The Hellenic Army General Staff replied that the helicopters in the pictures were not operational and that the operational ones had been transferred safely. Late last Saturday night, it was reported that the specific air base was evacuated.
However, Documento editor Vaxevanis posed (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) several pressing questions for Defence Minister Dendias to answer (he has not). Among others, he asked him if it is rational for an airbase to flood if seven modern to-be-repaired Apachi were ‘trapped’ in Stefanovikio air base as the electric door wouldn’t open, and the generator wouldn’t work and if most of the light weaponry and some helicopter spare parts were still under the water.
The ND government swears blind they are dedicated to Greece’s national security.
Well, it appears there are now doubts even about that.
How and why did Thessaly Plain drown?
Poor -if any- implementation of anti-flooding works, government incompetence, and the storm's intensity (in this order) proved a fatal mix.
The digital news outlet “News 24/7” published a good explainer video. To summarise the main points: The government sent a 112 evacuation alert to the villages at risk after they had flooded. The area was also hit in 2020 by the Ianos storm, yet not a single comprehensive anti-flooding work was realized in the aftermath. Plus, the competent ministries predicted the Daniel storm disaster with stunning accuracy.
It had been raining non-stop in Karditsa since 6 September in the morning. The first embankment outside Karditsa (Mavrika area) broke the same night. It had broken also in 2020, yet the anti-flooding structure was not reinforced. It released water toward villages in the plain. At the same time, another embankment outside Karditsa (1000 Trees area) broke. 112 alerted Karditsa city, which was not at risk, and not the villages in the East that were in danger. On the same day, in the afternoon, another embankment broke (Iperia), quite a few km away. As tributaries were beginning to ‘swell,’ at least another three dams broke. The villages were covered in water within 30 minutes. 112 alerted people there when it was all over. The government refuted that one/some of the embankments had been broken on purpose. It is reportedly considered a usual practice to break embankments to send water away from inhabited areas.
A few days later, on Thursday, deputy regional governor of Karditsa Kostas Noussios admitted (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) that he ordered the opening of one of the embankments (Kalentzis River) the night that storm Daniel was sweeping across Central Greece, an opening that led to the flooding and wipe out of Palamas village. The Supreme Court prosecutor ordered an investigation also into this decision (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).
This disaster had been predicted. As the explainer video noted, the 2018 Environment Ministry floods prediction maps pointed to the now flooded area and the 2022 Political Protection plan for flooding. Thessaly Regional Governance had the primary responsibility for the realization of anti-flooding works. They called upon “bureaucracy” and blamed the delay on Environmental reports needed. They claimed they cleaned rivers and channeled streams. “It is not clear if the Infrastructure and Environment Ministries fully understand these works. Neither if there is a complete plan and who is in charge of supervising it, if it is not the government,” the video concluded.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday called (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) for an investigation into the potential mismanagement of thousands of euros in funding for anti-flooding and other work in central Greece’s flood-struck Thessaly region.
Infrastructure in Central Greece keeps collapsing (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) almost two weeks after storm Daniel.
“I will leave, I will leave, I say this with grief, but I will abandon my country,”
said the 57-year-old president of an agricultural association, viticulturalist, wine-maker Vaios Ganis told (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) SKAI TV. He described the massive destruction and the great bulk of money he would need to reinstate his cultivations - he was the voice of all in desperation.
Meanwhile, at the time of writing, there was a ‘red alert’ again as Lake Karla (at the heart of the area) was about to overflow (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) as it collected the flood water from all around. A 112 alert SMS had been sent to nearby villages.
It is worth mentioning that Lake Karla was once upon a time one of the most important wetlands in the country. It was, however, desiccated in the period 1962-1964. Some say it was because it was flooding often, and people feared malaria due to the mosquitos. Others claim it was because the then PM Konstantinos Karamanlis wanted the votes of people in the area, so he decided to give them more arable land. However, it was soon obvious that this did more harm than good. Lake Karla was partly restored in 2018, but only 3,800 from the initial 19,000 hectares.
And now, what?
Thessaly Plain accounts for some 25% of Greece’s agricultural production. Hence, the threat of shortages and price hikes now looms large, as Politico reported (Öffnet in neuem Fenster):
“About a quarter of Greece’s wheat and barley are grown there, as well as more than 30 percent of its cotton, a third of chickpeas, lentils, and pistachios, a fifth of the hay used in livestock farming as well as half the industrial tomato production”.
Fruit and dried nuts, as well as pears, apples, chestnuts, and walnuts production, sometimes surpasses (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) 50% as a percentage of the country's total production.
Thessaly Plain also fed the country (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)with some 18% of cow meat, a very high percentage of pork (estimated at 70%), sheep & goat meat (a third) while it is the top producer of sheep and goat milk (from which feta cheese is produced) - some 18.5 (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)%. Some 40% of soft and 25% of hard cheese is produced there - they also export it.
Experts warn (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) that with silt and mud settling across fields, the flooding could affect soil quality for years. Efthymios Lekkas, a disaster management expert, told state television that it would take at least five years for the plain to become fertile again.
The area accounts for some 5.2% of the Greek GDP; it constitutes 15% of the total arable land, produces 14.1% of the total agriculture-forestry-fishery product, and accounts for 6.4% of the workforce, according (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) to Alpha Bank.
The catastrophe in Thessaly is disastrous for the people of the area. It also affects the whole country.
The estimate of the amount of financial damage caused by storm Daniel is growing by the day, Kathimerini reported (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).
“From the 1.5 billion euros that government sources put it at last week, they are raising it to €2.5 billion. Economists, however, taking into account the total destruction in the economy and not only the fiscal cost, are talking about damage of €3-5 billion, although nothing can be precisely calculated yet since the damage recording has not been completed.”
At this crucial time, the government makes promises. But they have proved incapable or unwilling to keep any promises, as Ianos storm in 2020 proved.
And it’s not only that. When people gathered outside the Thessaly Regional Governance Coordination Centre in Larissa on 10 September to protest the arrival of PM Mitsotakis, they were ‘greeted’ with tear gas and flash grenades (Öffnet in neuem Fenster).
A policeman was captured on (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) video pressing on the neck (George Floyd murder style) of a protester-flood victim.
The next day, Greek government-friendly media (such as Ellada24) claimed (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) protesters were not flood victims but anarchists.
However, real anarchists were busy doing other things. Anarchist collective Rouvikosas has been collecting (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) and delivering tons of aid for the people in the flooded areas.
People from all over Greece have mobilized to send aid to the flood-stricken. As veteran photojournalist Marios Lolos said (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) in an interview:
“I did not see any state mechanism distributing food and water. I saw food and water coming from people in solidarity.”
But, yeah, as of 10 September 2023, the ND government hired (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) 800 judicial policemen. What more could we possibly want?
Read
Director Lanthimos wins Venice’s Golden Lion award (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
Survivors of Pylos shipwreck file suit at Maritime Court of Piraeus (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
Greece Is Making a Killing selling Ships to Russia: (Öffnet in neuem Fenster) The world’s largest ship-owning nation is profiting from the sale of aging vessels, while enabling Moscow’s sanctions evasion.
Antonis murder: Shipping minister resigns, two crew members jailed (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
Crew member about Antonis: “I thought he was black, Pakistani” (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
Seamen on 24h strike in solidarity with Antonis’ family (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
Looting in flood-stricken houses in Central Greece. Four arrests (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
Bishop on a tractor blesses locals in flood-stricken areas (video) (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
Mandatory property insurance back on the table after floods (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
Asylum seekers to be moved out of camp for flood-stricken residents (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
Femicide: Police officer kills ex wife, takes his own life (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
Turkish national arrested as suspect for mafia-style shootings (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
Three children injured when plaster falls on their heads in Athens school (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
Man arrested for illegally hoarding ancient artifacts in his garden (Öffnet in neuem Fenster)
That’s all for this week,
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The AL team
