On the island of Kos in Greece, more than 70 Finnish tourists were evacuated due to wildfires. They were taken in the evening and at night from the hotels to the football stadium and to the church.
Several travel agencies evacuated travelers from hotels due to wildfires on the island of Kos in Greece during Monday evening and overnight. Among them are at least more than 70 Finns.
There are wildfires in the Kardamena village area on the south side of the island.
TUI’s Finnish communications manager Laura Aaltonen says that the Greek authorities received information before nine o’clock in the morning that travelers can return to their hotels. According to the authorities, the fires have been brought under control.
TUI’s Danish Communications Manager Mikkel Hansen said earlier on Tuesday morning that TUI evacuated 27 Finnish tourists at the request of the authorities. According to Hansen, the tourists were moved from the hotels to the football stadium.
Four of Tjäreborg’s Finnish customers were also evacuated on Monday evening, says Tjäreborg’s country manager Jessica Virtanen. Two of them have not been reached.
– The two Finns have not been contacted, although we have tried to call and send messages several times. They have been in hotels evacuated by the authorities. We are still trying to reach them constantly. Of course, the phone lines are pretty tight, so it’s not necessarily possible to get in touch, Virtanen says.
The passengers of Tjäreborg were first evacuated to the football stadium and transported from there to the town of Kos in the northern part of the island, where there are no wildfires.
Mari Kanerva Aurinkomatkat’s communication says that 15 of their customers have been evacuated. According to information received by Kanerva, the authorities directed them to spend the night in a church.
According to Apollomattki, 30 of their customers were evacuated.
According to Hansen, travel agencies have so far not been told to evacuate passengers from the island completely, because there are wildfires only in part of the island.
A total of dozens of passengers have been evacuated from the wildfires. For example of the Swedish public broadcasting company SVT according to about 50 Swedish tourists were evacuated from their hotels on Monday evening. Among the travel agencies, at least TUI and Apollo have evacuated their customers.
There have been dozens of wildfires in Greece in recent days, for example near the capital Athens and on the island of Crete.
Probably not a big deal, says the Foreign Ministry’s Tanner
Consular Head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Jussi Tanner says that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has not been contacted about the wildfires in Kos during the night.
– It probably means that there is no major emergency, Tanner said on ‘s morning broadcast at eight o’clock on Tuesday morning.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs does not have exact information on the number of Finns on Kos, but according to Tanner, there may be tens of thousands of Finns on the Greek islands.
He urges tourists to contact tour operators and follow the instructions of local authorities.
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Updated 2.7. 9:42 a.m.: Added information that the fires have been brought under control and that travelers can return to hotels. At 9:45, the number of Finnish passengers was updated and information about Apollo trips was added. At 11:24 updated information about two Finns who have not been reached.