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| A man stands behind a wave breaker to protect himself from powerful winds in the port of Rafina |
Ships were held in dock at ports across Greece on Thursday and schools were ordered to shut down in the Attica region around Athens on Friday as the country braced for a Mediterranean autumn cyclone.
Temperatures plunged unexpectedly by up to 10 degrees Celsius and gusting winds blew garbage containers off the streets of Athens and led to power cuts and tree falls in several areas of Greece.
Firefighters received hundreds of calls for assistance to remove downed trees and other objects on Thursday.
The civil protection service urged municipalities and citizens to be on the alert for a storm dubbed “Xenophon”.
Winds were forecast to intensify and rain set to pound parts of the country later on Thursday and Friday, Greece’s National Weather Service said.
Michalis Petrakis, a former head of the National Observatory of Athens, said wind speeds could reach 90 kilometres (56 miles) per hour, though he did not anticipate a disaster.
“There is no reason to panic,” he told state television.
The storm was already affecting some Greek islands – Kythera was struggling with severe power cuts while firefighters were trying to douse flames fanned by strong winds on Kefalonia.
The Athens area has recently been hit by deadly fires and flash floods. In 2017, 24 people were killed and left scores homeless after a rain-swollen torrent inundated two coastal towns west of the capital.
