ATHENS – While it may have seemed there were fewer wildfires in Greece so far this summer – with more equipment and firefighters deployed, data from the Athens Observatory showed five times more land burned in June than the average from 2010-24.

The 18 largest forest fires in the month burned some 9,800 hectares (24,216 acres) including a pine forest on Hydra set ablaze by fireworks, with eight rich Kazakhs charged with arson complicity but only after they left Greece without questioning.

The largest fire in terms of land coverage occurred in the area near the artificial lake Pinios at 3,620 hectares (8,945 acres), on the border of Achaia and Ilia in the Peloponnese, which almost annually suffers extensive blazes.

The estimates were “the result of detailed mapping using high-resolution Sentinel 2 satellite images from the Hellenic Mirror Site, combined with a record of burned areas from the European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS).”

A prosecutor charged a 35-year-old man with unintended arson over a wildfire that started in the Glyka Nera area of East Attica, one of four suspects said to fly a drone there which crashed and sparked a blaze. He was fined 4,675 euros ($5,062.)

While July has started off relatively cooler than the previous month, this June was the hottest ever recorded since meteorological records began being kept in 1860, the National Observatory said.

The average temperature for the month was 29.9 Celsius (85.82 Fahrenheit) but 35.6 Celsius (96.08 Fahrenheit) for the daytime, exacerbated by a lingering heat wave that hit 41.2 Celsius (106 Fahrenheit) in the capital at one point.

There was no relief at night either as the temperatures were 4.8 degrees Celsius hotter than the last 30-year point of reference, hitting a night time high of 29.5 degrees Celsius (85.1 Fahrenheit) on June 21.

Data from the observatory’s station in the downtown tourist area of Thiseio, the only spot with consecutive years’ worth of figures since 1860, showed the average temperature rose 1.7 degree Celsius in the last 10 years from the 1860-1900 mean.

While Athens has become a hot spot – literally and figuratively – for tourists spending more time in the city’s historic spots and funky neighborhoods known for restaurants and coffee shops, there are worries that heat will drive away visitors.