The surface area of land burnt during the fires starting on August 3 on the island of Evia is approximately 465,820 stremmas (46,582 hectares), the National Observatory of Athens’ center ‘Beyond’ said on Thursday.
The figure was reached after analysing 4 different high-resolutuon images from the European satellite Sentinel-2 on August 11, it said.
Beyond was also able to detect the different types of burnt land:
– 197,700 stremmas (19,770 hectares) of forestland
– 99,600 stremmas (9,960 ha) of low brush land
– 90,650 stremmas (9,065 ha) of farmland
– 77,720 stremmas (7,772 ha) of grassland
– 4,350 stremmas (435 ha) of green zones used for leisure activities
– 800 stremmas (80 ha) of sparse vegetation
With the recent major forest fires in recession or fully controlled, data from the European Forest Fire Information System EFFIS show that an interesting development:
Although the number of forest fires in 2021 in Greece shows a relatively small increase (26%) compared to the average of the period 2008 – 2020, the total burned area records an extremely large increase equal to about 450% compared to the corresponding average of the same period.
It is worth noting that based on these data, Greece is ranked first among the 15 Mediterranean countries examined, with a large difference from the second Turkey and the third Cyprus, which also record significant increases, notes the meteo service of the National Observatory of Athens..
