The nightmarish moments they experienced when the Eye was engulfed in flames, in July 2018, leading to the death of 104 people, continue to unfold in the ongoing trial at the Athens Trial Court, witnesses testifying in the audience.
"There was no coordination, no service was working," said in his testimony witness Con. Hadjistamatiou, who suffered 4th degree burns and had undergone multiple surgeries. The testimony of another witness, Alexandros Floros, who was in the sea for hours with his family, was shocking. "We saw plastic black bags that they were closing, if we stayed at home we would have been burned alive, the heat load was such that even the irons were melting[/B]", said this witness, referring to the complete absence of the authorities and stating that no one warned them to leave.
"I saw the fire coming towards us, there were ashes everywhere. I saw a dense flow of vehicles from Marathonos and down.[/B] I called to the family to come out and we got in the car to leave," the same witness, who together with his family members managed to reach the shore, also said.
"We went into the sea, at some point we lost the land, we couldn't see."
"We went into the sea, at some point we lost the land, we couldn't see. We were swimming, trying to stay together, the wind was getting stronger as the hour passed. We tried to stay in close proximity to each other. There were sparks falling, pine cones in the water. At one point my wife says, 'that was it...'," Floros said to add: "After many hours we saw some lights. We had arrived near the port of Rafina, it was a ship's lights. There was a fishing boat coming. It shone a torch light on us, then a bobbin. My wife was hypothermic, the children had turned blue. They gave us blankets. I saw a grandfather floating in the sea... They pulled a woman up, resuscitated her, she didn't make it... They took us to the shore, from the shock we couldn't remember to call one of our own... We couldn't see well, some ambulances could be seen on the shore. There we saw black plastic bags that they were closing... If we had stayed in the house we would have been burned alive. It was such a heat load that the iron melted..."
According to the Greek protothema.gr, the witness said in his testimony that he never saw a representative of the authorities. "The only uniformed person I saw was a dockworker at 11 at night at the port of Rafina," he said."
"I was burned to 30% of my body," Mr. Hadjistamatiou said, describing the efforts he made completely alone, he said, to save his family members, his wife, his daughter-in-law and his grandson from the flames. "We had returned from bathing in our house. Around 5:30 p.m. there was smoke at about 6:00 p.m. Large embers started falling. I saw the fire in our backyard. At 6:10 the power was out. I took my family and we left for the beach. My wife, my grandson and my daughter-in-law. ....My daughter-in-law passed out every 15 minutes, her respiratory system was affected in addition to the burns she had. I was looking for water to give her, her and my grandson. I saw parked fire trucks looking at the fire. I mean 6:45 the Mayor of Rafina came on TV and said that we were in no danger from the fire, that it was going towards Dionysus, and that we could drive around in our cars. If we hadn't seen the smoke we would have been burned. No one informed us."
For his part, witness Ioannis Chatziathanasiou, who lost his sister in the deadly fire, said in his testimony: "I saw the house destroyed. I then saw the car with the keys in it and with suitcases loaded it was burned, unfortunately no helicopter showed up to make drops. I only saw one drop around 5 p.m. There was no care, I was not notified by anyone, nor did I have any information."
Finally, it should be noted that during the examination of a witness, tensions rose between the defence and prosecution lawyers, while from the audience relatives of the victims shouted "shame on you" while addressing the defence.
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