On Monday, hundreds of Swedes were forced to evacuate their hotels in Kardamena on the island of Kos in Greece. The fires that ravaged the island had come dangerously close, prompting authorities on the ground to make the decision to evacuate.
They were ferried by buses to safe places, conference rooms, sports halls and even a football facility. One of them was William Hansson, 20, who was there with some friends on what they thought would be a relaxing holiday.
They had spent Monday in Kos town and on the way home to the hotel they saw what William first thought was a hurricane with yellow-brown clouds. As they approached the hotel, they saw how flames had spread over the mountains. At this stage no evacuation order had been given yet so they sat down to lunch. But shortly afterwards the alarm sounded and the evacuation was a fact.
– Then buses came and picked us up and drove us to a soccer field where we had to spend the night on the grass field under the open sky, he says.
The football field was also shared with up to 2,000 other people in what could be compared to scenes from a movie, says William.
– Children walk around screaming, people stand and throw boxes of food to get everything in. Water came and… It was like… I don’t know. It was almost like it was taken out of a movie.
As if nothing happened
And there was no further night either.
– We didn’t get any sleep, I nodded off a couple of times but no more than that, you’ve been quite tired today and just wanted to sleep.
After the long night, William and his friends were told that they could return to the same hotel they left in a hurry on Monday. And during Tuesday, it’s like nothing happened.
– Today it’s completely as usual, we have a mountain in front of us so we don’t look away from where it burned the most. But right now the sky is clear blue and there is no sign of what has happened.
And the hopes for the rest of the trip are that nothing like this will happen to anyone.
– We hope for good weather, some good food and maybe something good to drink.
Hear William Hansson tell about the experience in the video above.