ATHENS, Greece — Dozens of wildfires broke out across Greece, torching olive groves, cutting off villages and sending residents fleeing Saturday as one of the largest blazes swept perilously close to the capital's northern suburbs.
Fanned by high winds, the fires stretched the state's resources thin as firefighters tried to extinguish at least half a dozen major conflagrations.
Some villages threatened lay near the town of Marathon, from which in 490 B.C., legend has it, a Greek soldier ran to Athens to announce that the Persians had been defeated, giving the modern long-distance foot race its name.
Just after 9 p.m. local time, authorities told residents of the Athens suburb of Pendeli to evacuate. Traffic clogged roads leading south; in places, the flames licked as close to the road as 30 yards.
Fire raced toward the villages of Grammatiko, Kalentzi and Varnavas, near Marathon, 25 miles northeast of the Greek capital, cutting the villages off from the road. Residents and volunteers tried desperately to prevent the blaze from engulfing houses.
Scores of residents fled on foot, by motorbike and in cars. Some were seen running down the road away from the flames.
Dozens of houses lay destroyed, according to local mayors speaking on TV channels.Firefighters rescued at least four elderly people who were trapped in their homes in the Athens suburb of Rodopolis. One volunteer firefighter was injured.
The blaze was moving toward more heavily populated residential areas closer to Athens.
The government declared a state of emergency Saturday for the region of Attica and warned that continuing winds made itlikely more fires would break out over the weekend.
Winds are expected to drop overnight but are forecast to reach gale force again today.
Authorities are worried that the fires will rage through the night because firefighting planes and helicopters will stop operating at dusk.
"The coming night will be especially difficult," fire brigade spokesman Yiannis Kalpakis told reporters. "We urge people to remain calm and, in any case, not panic."
He said 75 fires had broken out across Greece since early Saturday morning.
Of those, six, including the one outside Athens, blazed unabated: two on the Aegean island of Skyros and one each on the island of Evia, the western island of Zakynthos - where about 750 acres have burned - and near the town of Plataea, 40 miles northwest of Athens.
Three more fires - one on Zakynthos, one near Corinth and one near the city of Nafplio, in southern Greece - were "partially contained," Kalpakis said.
Front Section, Pages 10 on 08/23/2009