ATHENS, Greece — A partial drop in gale-force winds early today offered hard-pressed Greek firefighters a brief respite after wildfires raged for two days north of Athens, burning houses and parts of forests while forcing thousands to evacuate their homes.
Officials warned that the vast blaze was still threatening inhabited areas on the capital's northern fringes and near Marathon - site of one of history's most famous battlegrounds.
"There are fewer hazardous points," Fire Brigade spokesman Yiannis Kappakis said. "But the blaze is still developing."
Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis said the fire - one of more than 90 that broke out across Greece over the weekend - was still very hard to tackle.
"The situation remains very difficult," he said after a Fire Brigade briefing. "The enormous [firefighting] effort will continue on all fronts throughout the night."
Firefighters were set to gain a new boost at first light today, when water-dropping aircraft will resume operations, assisted by aircraft from France, Italy and Cyprus. Nearly 2,000 firefighters and soldiers are engaging the blaze on the ground, together with hundreds of volunteers.
In many afflicted areas, however, despairing residents pleaded for firefighters and equipment that were nowhere to be seen.
Earlier Sunday, tens of thousands of residents of Athens' northern outskirts evacuated their homes, fleeing in cars or on foot. The fire destroyed several houses as it advanced across an area more than 30 miles in circumference.
Six major fires were burning early today across Greece. The Athens blaze started north of Marathon plain, and spread over Mount Penteli - on the city's limit to the north - threatening outlying suburbs.
Driven by gale-force winds, the blaze grew fastest near Marathon, from which the long-distance foot race takes its name, born from a legendary run after the 490 B.C Athenian victory over an invading Persian army.
One resident, Nikos Adamopoulos, said he had driven over a large part of the area and saw no firefighters.
"The Museum of Marathon is being encircled by fire and flames are closing in on [the archaeological site of] Rhamnus," he said. Rhamnus is home to two 2,500-year-old temples.
The mayor of Marathon said he had been "begging the government to send over planes and helicopters" to no avail.
"There are only two fire engines here; three houses arealready on fire and we are just watching helplessly," Mayor Spyros Zagaris told Greek TV.
Zagaris was among several local leaders who accused the government of having no plan to fight the fire.
Finance Minister Yiannis Papathanassiou responded: "This is not the time for criticism under these tragic conditions. We are fighting a difficult fight."
Another official said emergency workers were exhausted.
"The firefighters, soldiers and volunteers fighting the fire are tired and their equipment is being used constantly and there is fatigue there too," said deputy Interior Minister Christos Markoyiannakis.
Opposition politicians have been restrained in their criticism so far.
But both Communist Party leader Aleka Papariga and Giorgos Karatzaferis, head of populist right-wing Popular Orthodox Rally, said the government had learned nothing from the catastrophic summer fires of 2007, when 76 people died and several villages were destroyed in southern Greece.
A shift in wind helped halt the flames in the town of Agios Stefanos, a township on the fringes of Athens on the opposite side of Mount Penteli from Marathon. Most of its 10,000 inhabitants had evacuated Sunday afternoon. By nightfall, the town was empty, authorities said.
The nine helicopters and 14 planes that operated during the day, including two planes sent from Italy, dumped some 4,000 tons of water on the fire, but apparently without much success. Television showed airplanes and helicopters dropping water on a forest outside Agios Stefanos - and the fire re-igniting moments after they left.
About 58 square miles of forest, brush and olive groves have burned. The highly flammable pine forests around Athens' northern suburbs helped the fire spread.
Athens prefect Yiannis Sgouros said the full extent of the damage would take days to estimate.
Authorities evacuated two large children's hospitals, as well as campsites and homes in villages and outlying suburbs threatened by blazes that scattered ash across Athens. The flames also approached a large monastery on Mount Penteli.
Elsewhere in Greece, serious fires were reported on the islands of Evia and Skyros in the Aegean Sea and Zakynthos in the west. Another large fire that started Saturday near the town of Plataea, 40 miles northwest of Athens, was spreading unchecked toward a coastal resort in western Attica.
Front Section, Pages 4 on 08/24/2009