'We fought a great battle': Greece defends wildfire response

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — As Greece's massive wildfires were being tamed Tuesday, the country's civil protection chief strongly defended the country's firefighting efforts, saying every resource was thrown into the fight against what he described as the fire service's worst challenge ever.

Nikos Hardalias said authorities “truly did what was humanly possible” against blazes that destroyed tens of thousands of hectares (acres) of forest and hundreds of homes, cost a volunteer firefighter his life and forced over 60,000 people to flee. Two other firefighters were in intensive care with severe burns.

“We handled an operationally unique situation, with 586 fires in eight days during the worst weather conditions we’ve seen in 40 years,” Hardalias told a press conference. “Never was there such a combination of adverse factors in the history of the fire service.”

Climate scientists say there is little doubt that climate change from the burning of coal, oil and natural gas is driving extreme events, such as heat waves, droughts, wildfires, floods and storms. Researchers can directly link a single event to climate change only through intensive data analysis, but they say such calamities are expected to happen more frequently.

Greece had just experienced its worst heat wave since 1987, which left its forests tinder-dry, and other nearby nations like Turkey and Italy also faced the same searing temperatures and quickly spreading fires.

Worsening drought and heat – both linked to climate change – are also driving wildfires this summer in the U.S. West and in Siberia in northern Russia.

In Greece, the worst blaze still burning Tuesday was in the northern section of Evia, the country's second-largest island, which is linked by a bridge to the mainland north of Athens and is a favorite...