Two dead, three missing as rainstorm pounds Greece for second day

At least two people died and four were missing on Wednesday after torrential rain flooded homes and businesses and destroyed infrastructure in central Greece, the fire brigade said.

Since Monday, Storm Daniel has triggered landslides, destroyed a bridge, caused the collapse of power poles and carried away dozens of cars in muddy waters, days after a two-week deadly wildfire died out in the north.

The body of an elderly woman was recovered close to a seaside community in the southern Pelion area near the port city of Volos on the Pagasetic Gulf on Wednesday, the fire brigade said, raising the death toll from severe weather in Greece to two.

A man died on Tuesday after a wall collapsed in bad weather in Volos and about 94 inmates were moved to safety after torrential rain damaged part of their nursing home.

A Reuters journalist said that an overflowing river near the nursing home swallowed the road and flooded a train station in Volos.

Authorities were looking for four people missing, Climate Crisis and Civil Protection Minister Vassilis Kikilias said in a televised news conference.

Some 10 people were trapped on the banks of a torrent in southern Pelion, Michalis Mitzikos, a local mayor, told Skai television.

Greece has said the weather was the most extreme, in terms of rainfall, since records have been kept.

“Yesterday the rainfall was very intense, unprecedented,” said Vasilis Batsios, 44, in Volos. “For 24 hours it was nonstop and there was a lot of water, the amount of water was unbelievable.”

The volume of water that fell in Pelion on Tuesday was equal to annual rainfall in London, meteorologist George Tsatrafyllias said on platform X, formerly known as Twitter.

Police on Wednesday issued traffic warnings for the cities of Trikala and Karditsa as the rainstorm was not expected to weaken before Thursday.

Some 158 vehicles and hundreds of emergency crews have been operating in other areas hit by downpours across Greece to help people at risk or with health issues, Kikilias said.

Flash floods in Greece in 2017 killed 25 people and left hundreds homeless.

In northwest Turkey, at least five people were killed after heavy rains triggered flash floods, Turkish state broadcaster TRT Haber.