Greece declared a monthlong state of emergency in its central port metropolis of Volos on Saturday after 1000’s of freshwater fish died, the nation’s most important information company reported.
Authorities have promised additional money and different assist to cope with the mass die-off, in what’s the space’s second environmental catastrophe in a 12 months.
Why have so many fish died?
Authorities stated the freshwater fish died because of devastating floods that hit Greece’s central Thessaly area final 12 months.
The storms flooded extra than 20,000 hectares of land and refilled the close by Lake Karla that had been drained in 1962 in a bid to combat malaria, swelling it to a few instances its regular measurement.
The lake waters have since receded drastically, because of a extreme drought, forcing the fish towards the Volos port that empties into the Pagasetic Gulf and the Aegean Sea.
However they can’t survive the salty sea waters and 1000’s of useless fish have clogged the waters across the port metropolis, which is about a three-and-a-half-hour drive north of Athens.
What are authorities doing?
The Civil Safety Emergency measure will permit native authorities to commit funding and different assets to complete the cleanup of the fish, the Athens Information Company reported.
The emergency was declared by Local weather Minister Vassilis Papageorgiou and is about to final till September 30.
The operation to take away the fish has been underway for a number of days, with fishing trawlers chartered by the regional authorities, together with earthmovers, to scoop up the useless fish.
The fish are then loaded onto vans and brought to an incinerator.
On Tuesday alone, authorities stated that they had eliminated 57 tons of the washed-up useless fish.
By Thursday, officers stated 100 tons of the fish had been picked up.
Ertnews channel reported that two boats are because of proceed the restoration operation on Saturday.
Particular nets have additionally been positioned on the mouth of the Xiria River to assist include the big quantity of useless fish.
Authorized motion, formal investigation launched
The mayor of Volos lashed out on the regional authority, accusing it of appearing too slowly, telling a information convention on Wednesday that the odor from the useless fish was insufferable.
Tourism to the area has plunged by practically 80% since final 12 months’s flooding, in keeping with the native affiliation of eating places and bars.
“The scenario with this useless fish would be the demise of us,” Stefanos Stefanou, the president of the affiliation, stated earlier this week. “What customer will come to our metropolis after this?”
Volos’ Chamber of Commerce stated it was taking authorized motion to hunt damages after the extreme drop in industrial exercise.
The general public prosecutor has launched an investigation into the disaster.
Greece is seeing growing incidents of excessive climate that scientists hyperlink to local weather change.
They embody increased temperatures and erratic rainfall that trigger wildfires and flooding.