Coated with ash: the aftermath of the wildfires

More than a week after the devastating wildfires struck, the 16 affected villages in Limassol find themselves surrounded by ash. A burnt smell lingers in the air, and even though the fire has long since been extinguished, you can still see wisps of smoke rising in isolated spots.

Charred landslides stretch as far as the eye can see, interrupted only by some small spots that were spared the flames. While those who have lost their homes remain in temporary accommodation, most whose houses were only partly damaged have returned.

In Ypsonas, around 12 kilometres from fire-struck Souni, an aid centre has been set up. Civil defence and police sit on folding tables in the shady backyard of the municipal hall, coordinating deliveries to the affected villages. Food is being served three times a day, breakfast, lunch and dinner, all donated by local restaurants.

“The area has been suffering from fires for years, but never to this extent,” says Giorgios Nikolaos, managing director of Limassol civil defence, once we enter Souni.

He recalls the past week, when flames still raged around the villages. Luckily, he was at the office and able to quickly mobilise the civil defence forces, some of them, like him, public servants, but many others trained volunteers.

“I got my first call about the fire a few minutes before 2pm [on Wednesday, July 22],” Giorgos says, “from then on, I was constantly on the phone.”

While during the fires, civil defence took over evacuation of people, his task now is driving around the villages, delivering food, finding out people’s needs and organising accommodation.

“We’re primarily trained for earthquakes and evacuations,” he explains, adding that their intervention in wildfires, on the other hand, has in recent years become an unwelcome summer routine.

After passing through Souni, including some pauses to get a sense of how much of the landscape was destroyed, we stop at the Ayios Akindinoi chapel in Kivides.

Almost everything around here has been burnt, except for the chapel itself. Outside, on the stone walls, someone has left bread and seeds for the birds. The chapel is located on a hill from where the full picture becomes even clearer: black landscapes to the left and village houses to the right that were lucky enough not to catch fire.

A single thistle with two dried flowers stands in the chapel’s backyard, dancing in the breeze and seemingly unimpressed by the fact that its stem has been half burned. The brown soil in which it grew is now permeated with black.

A ten-minute drive away in Malia, Marilena Athini, the local mukhtar, sits on a long table surrounded by her family and residents of the 60-people-village. They’re eating the souvlaki that the civil defence must have brought earlier, and while all of them wear a smile on their face, they clearly – and to no surprise – seem tired and somewhat resigned.

When asked about what kind of support she hopes for during this critical period, what exactly feels the government could or should be doing, Marilena responds calmly.

“Right now we’re okay,” she says, “we don’t expect anything from the government anyway.” Marilena points at Giorgos and adds that she’s grateful for the support of civil defence.

Since the fires occur every year, I ask her whether she takes any precautions, aside from a plan to evacuate the village as per her mukhtari responsibilities.

“I just get in the car and go if I have to,” she laughs, only to casually add that another fire had broken out two weeks previously, but that the villagers “took care of it themselves”.

Five minutes from the centre of Malia, up the hill, Marilena’s house stands destroyed. Only burnt walls and ash remain. It is impossible to tell where the furniture once was. Almost ironically, a shiny new outdoor faucet for a hose stands beside the ruin. It’s unclear whether it was installed during the firefighting efforts or somehow survived, like the stubborn thistle in Kivides.

The house is only ten steps away from the local mosque, a reminder of the time Turkish Cypriots lived in the area. Giorgos says it had been renovated as a cultural site, now, it too has been reduced to a burned-out shell.

Some of the fire might be even spread by birds

On the way to Ayios Therapon, the black- and green burn patterns seen throughout the day continue, entire stretches of land reduced to ash, while vegetation just metres away remains untouched. Giorgos says these come down to several factors: firefighting tactics, unpredictable winds and then something more unusual.

“Sometimes it’s even the birds,” he says, “they catch fire and keep flying, maybe a few metres, maybe two kilometres. And once they fall, well…”

Further up the road, a burnt electricity pole leans dangerously to one side. Its wooden base, no thicker than five centimetres, has been almost completely charred and, as I realise when taking a picture, distressfully close to falling on the road.

In fact, Giorgos tells me that the poles were a major issue in the first two days, as they caught fire just as this one, with some falling onto the road.

Once we stop to chat with other civil defence personnel, two men from the EAC are parked next to us, moving electricity poles. One of them, Makis, tells me he’s been working since 6am (it’s now 3pm) and that today alone they’ve replaced 13 poles.

“We’re going to replace this one down there later,” he says, pointing to the burnt down pole I photographed earlier.

Then three cars with other civil defence officers arrive. Diana and Michalis are volunteers from nearby villages, both in their forties. They both have full-time jobs, but having grown up in the area, are also well aware of the dangers of the forest fires. When I ask how they manage both the demanding volunteering and their full-time jobs, they smile and shrug. “We do… somehow,” Diana says.

‘I put crosses and holy water everywhere’

Back in Souni, Andri sits on the porch of what is left from her house. Her voice shaky, a bowl of food and water for her now two cats, one most probably died in the fires, in front of her.

While the houses next to her have not suffered any damage, her house has been almost completely burnt to the ground.

“I only took my sister’s picture and my Holy Mary icon with me,” she says, a necklace with a cross around her neck. She says she called the fire brigade multiple times, but they never came. Eventually, her former husband came from Ayia Napa and dragged her out of the house at the last minute, she says.

In the partly spared backyard, crosses which she put while the flames came closer, mark the walls. She says she sprinkled holy water on all surrounding houses and prayed for her pine tree not to be affected. The tree was in fact spared from the fire, while just five metres away, smoke still rises from the scorched ground.

She says she is currently staying in a hotel, with two more nights left and needs to figure out next steps. Officials have already recorded the damage, and she is now awaiting her compensation from the government.

Back at the municipal hall in Ypsonas, some 15 civil defence volunteers from Nicosia and Paphos sit under the trees in their orange and blue uniforms. Some came straight from work. Giorgos nods toward them while they arrange boxes of souvla.

“It’s time for dinner now,” he says.