Wild footage circulating on social media shows tourists fleeing their hotels as wildfires ravage the Greek tourist island of Rhodes.
In one eerie clip taken at the Lindian Village Beach Resort – Hilton, an emergency alarm could be heard going off as a staffer informs guests to “evacuate the premises immediately”.
Some guests could still be seen in their swimmers enjoying the pool before rushing to leave the hotel.
The backdrop shows the sky mostly covered in smoke.
The hotel guest who filmed the footage and shared it to TikTok informed followers they were able to get to safety.
“We are now finally in Rhodes town! It was a long slog to get here, 4hrs on a ferry – boarded at 2am,” she wrote.
“We had to leave all our luggage (including passports) and missed our flight home but we are booked to go tomorrow.”
She said she was grateful her hotel organised transport, adding tourists staying at other hotels had to walk for 6km to the evacuation point at Gennadi Beach.
She shared viral footage showing thousands of people walking to the beach.
She also encouraged people to consider helping local initiatives and wildlife of Rhodes following the devastation caused by the wildfires.
Temperatures have soared to over 40 degrees on the Greek island as a result of an ongoing heatwave across southern Europe.
Thousands of other tourists camped out at Rhodes airport on Sunday trying to get a flight home.
British tourist Kelly Squirrel told AFP said she was among many who had no choice but to walk for hours through the blistering heat to reach the airport.
“We had to keep walking,” she said told the news agency at the international airport on the Greek island
“So we walked for about six hours in the heat.”
Rhodes sits in the Dodecanese archipelago off Greece’s southeast coast and the fires there started with the tourist season in full swing.
Ms Squirrel said that it while she was sitting by her hotel pool on Saturday, that she “saw the flames” approaching.
“The police came to reception and told everyone to get to the beach,” she continued. “So we ran down to the beach. We just sat there for fifteen minutes, half an hour.” As the fumes became thicker, “we were told to move along the beach”, she said.
Huddled in the departure hall
Meanwhile, in the departure hall of the airport several dozen kilometres from the fire, some holiday-makers were sleeping on the floor, next to their luggage.
Others were huddled in front of the departure board, trying to spot a flight to Hamburg, Amsterdam or Lille, in northern France.
Some passed the time playing cards, while children were trying to get some rest by lying on inflatable beach toys.
Claire O’Donavan from the UK explained she too had taken a long walk under the sun with her suitcases.
“We (finally) managed to get a truck that took us to another beach,” she said. “At the hotel, we were told to ‘wait here, we’ll be back in an hour or two’, and then they disappeared. So there we were, it was pitch dark, you could see the fire in the distance.”
Rhodes, which counted 2.5 million visitor arrivals in 2022, is one of Greece’s leading holiday destinations. It has hotels all along its eastern coastline.
World tourism leader TUI announced it was suspending all flights bringing in more tourists to Rhodes.
“Those customers currently in Rhodes will return on their intended flight home,” it added. British low-cost carrier Jet2 also cancelled flights carrying incoming tourists.
A total of 12 towns and villages in the centre and south of the island were evacuated, including Lindos, one of the main attractions for travellers, with its hilltop Acropolis.
Island officials arranged for the thousands of people forced to leave their homes or hotels to shelter in gymnasiums, schools and conference centres on Saturday night.
The fire in Rhodes was fanned by strong winds, while on Sunday, according to the EMY National Weather Service, the thermometer registered 36 degrees.