EPILOGUE OF THE TRAGEDY IN GREECE: Danish pilot and Greek firefighter killed in helicopter collision during firefighting efforts!

A Danish pilot and a liaison officer of the Greek Fire Service were killed after two firefighting helicopters collided while extinguishing a fire in Greece. A British pilot and a Greek coordinator, who were in the second helicopter, survived.

The leased helicopters collided while battling a forest fire in the Psatha area west of the capital Athens, the fire service announced. Video footage shows one helicopter hitting the other, which explodes and falls to the ground in flames.

Wildfires broke out in Greece on August 2, forcing thousands of people to evacuate. Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis previously said that Greece is facing “extreme weather conditions,” with winds reaching 100 kilometers per hour.

“When winds blow with such force, even dozens of aircraft we have at our disposal cannot operate safely,” he wrote on Facebook.

Greece is currently facing several major fires in different areas.

Nearly 500 firefighters are battling fires around the popular coastal village of Porto Germeno, 70 kilometers northwest of Athens, the fire service announced. They are trying to prevent the spread of the fire toward the western outskirts of Athens after it climbed the mountain overnight.

Around 100 firefighters are battling another fire in Aegialia in the northern Peloponnese.

🔴 Two Bell 214ST firefighting helicopters collided mid-air while battling a major forest fire in the Psatha area, west of Athens, Greece, triggering a search and rescue operation.

✈️ Aircraft involved: One helicopter was Bell 214ST N511EV (serial 28105, built in 1982), while… pic.twitter.com/Jwd3qpLAfj
— FL360aero (@fl360aero) August 2, 2026

A new fire broke out late on August 1 on the island of Cephalonia in the Ionian Sea, a popular Greek tourist destination.

A day later, a 44-year-old man was detained on Cephalonia under suspicion of intentionally starting the fire, according to the Greek news agency ANA.

Greece is one of several European countries hit by major wildfires. A series of heatwaves and little rain have created favorable conditions for them.

Since mid-July, wildfires have erupted in France, Spain, and Portugal, forcing hundreds of thousands of people to evacuate. Officials in the Spanish capital, Madrid, said these are the worst fires in history.

More than 200,000 hectares of land have burned across the country in 2026, roughly five times the average up to this point in the year, European Union data shows.

French President Emmanuel Macron last week described the wildfire that broke out in the Gironde region of France as “completely unprecedented.” In that part of France, the temperature from the fire created a rare pyrocumulonimbus cloud, or, as NASA calls it, the “fire-breathing dragon.”

The United Kingdom is also battling wildfires, with a fire that devastated a heathland in Suffolk brought under control on Saturday.