Death toll from Greek fires reaches 91 as village mourns

Orthodox faithful attend a memorial service for the victims of a forest fire, inside a church at Mati village, east of Athens. Photo / AP

Fire officials in Greece raised the death toll from a bushfire that raged through a coastal area east of Athens to 91 and reported that 25 people were missing - six days after Europe's deadliest forest fire in more than a century.

Before the national fire service updated the official number of fatalities, it stood at 86 as hundreds of mourners attended a memorial service for the victims in the seaside village hardest-hit by the blaze.

The fire sped flames through the village of Mati, a popular resort spot, without warning on July 23. A database maintained by the Centre for the Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters in Brussels shows it as the deadliest bushfire in Europe since 1900.

The vast majority of victims died in the fire itself, though a number drowned in the sea while fleeing the flames. Until today, Greek officials had not provided a tally of the people reported missing.

Hellenic Fire Service spokeswoman Stavroula Malliri provided a breakdown that illustrated why the death toll continued to expand and the list of people thought to be missing was difficult to draw up with precision.

Malliri said that 59 victims had been identified from bodies or remains and another four people injured in the fire had died in area hospitals. But identities have not yet been linked to another 28 sets of remains, she said.

Relatives or friends reported 25 people who were considered officially missing, Malliri said.

A fire service official said some or all of the 25 missing people could be among the yet-unidentified remains of the dead.

At the morning memorial service in Mati, the senior local Greek Orthodox Church official, Bishop Kyrillos, said the community was grieving the simultaneous loss of family, neighbours and friends.

"There's fewer of us now than usually," the bishop said. "It is the victims of the recent fire that are missing — friends, relatives and acquaintances, next-door people that we saw every day in town and on the beach."

The scene when people escaped fires by wading into the waters of the 'Silver Coast' beach in Mati, Greece. Photo / Elia Kallia, AP

Local resident Angeliki Galiatsatou said she narrowly managed to escape the fire that killed others in their cars and homes.

"I came to pray for the people who were lost and I pray that God blesses us all," she said.

Dozens of volunteer divers, some of them retired Navy Seals, kept searching the sea today looking for the bodies of more possible victims.

Greek authorities have said they have reason to believe the fire resulted from arson and turned so deadly because winds of up to 100km/h buffeted the pine-forested seaside resorts at the time.

The Greek government also has come under criticism for how buildings and roads were laid out in the area and an alleged lack of adequate preparation for fire season. More than 2000 homes were damaged in the fire and roughly a quarter will have to be demolished, Greek officials said.

- AP