ATHENS, Jan 22 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Two people died in Greece on Wednesday as violent winds lashed swathes of the country and heavy rainfall flooded roads and confined ferries to port.
Maritime Affairs Minister Vassilis Kikilias on X said a coastguard had died “in the line of duty” in the coastal town of Astros in the eastern Peloponnese.
Reports said he had been hit by a wave and fatally injured while urging local fishermen to leave the area.
Hours later, state TV ERT reported that a woman had died in the Athens suburb of Glyfada after being knocked over by a car swept by floodwater.
The storm front moving eastwards across Greece saw winds exceed 100 kilometres an hour, prompting authorities in Athens and in the west and the south to shut schools.
Meteorologists said the storm had dumped the equivalent of six weeks of rain in some areas, including parts of the capital.
Outdoor work was discouraged and the authorities sent warnings to the public to avoid unnecessary travel.
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis also postponed a planned trip to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
Deadly flooding in Greece during intense rainfall in recent years has forced the authorities to improve floodworks to limit damage.
In September 2023, the agricultural region of Thessaly in central Greece was devastated by a storm and catastrophic flooding that left 17 dead and drowned hundreds of thousands of farm animals.
In November 2017, heavy rain in Mandra, a semi-rural region near Athens, left 25 dead and dozens injured.
Experts have repeatedly called for infrastructure upgrades, especially in the greater Athens area, which is surrounded by mountains and crisscrossed by hundreds of waterways, most of them covered to accommodate rampant urbanisation in recent decades. — NNN-AGENCIES