Nowhere is the Mornos reservoir more indicative of the declining rainfall in Greece. And no settlement shows more clearly how severe the drought was this year than Kallio, a village that was flooded by the reservoir in the late 1970s.
Nearly five decades after Kallio was deliberately flooded during the construction of a dam to secure Athens’ water supply, local residents watched in disbelief as water reserves dwindled to the point where the village resurfaced.
“It’s a nightmarish situation,” said Apostolos Gerodimos, the head of the 60-member community that was forced to move inland when the dam was built about 200 kilometers west of Athens.
“As the water level drops, more and more buildings that were underwater will resurface. If it doesn’t rain this winter, the problem will get much worse.”
An estimated 80 buildings, including the Evangelistra Church and the Kallio Primary School, were “sacrificed” when the reservoir was built. The people who received compensation at the time moved to Athens and other urban centers or uphill, where they founded a new community.
Although the outline of the church has not yet been uncovered, the falling water level has now revealed the outline of the stone building that once housed the school.
Kostas Koutsoumbas, the village’s deputy mayor, believes the water level has “dropped 40 meters” this year and is flowing further south. “We haven’t seen anything like this since 1993,” he said. “If the situation doesn’t improve, it will be even worse than it was then.”
Greece is on the frontline of the climate crisis and has been hit by a series of heatwaves, exacerbated by years of erratic rainfall, with temperatures reaching record highs in June, July and August.
As a result, water scarcity has become a major problem in the Mediterranean country. Popular islands, many of which rely on wells and desalination plants, are particularly affected as the unprecedented influx of tourists puts increasing strain on climate-stressed resources.
In early July, before sweltering temperatures became commonplace, water company Eydap estimated that water levels in the Mornos reservoir had dropped by 30 percent compared to the same period last year.
Given the ongoing drought, Eydap officials are currently drawing up plans to improve water management, with an investment of €750 million (£631 million) planned.
In addition to the artificial lake fed by the Mornos and Evinos rivers, there are plans to develop Lake Yliki, located about 85 kilometers northwest of Athens.
Eydap is increasingly calling on people in the Attica region around Athens – the largest metropolitan area in the country with 3.7 million inhabitants – not to waste water.
Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said it was clear the country also needed to build more dams. “We cannot afford the luxury of wasting water,” he said this summer.
“At a time when we will certainly have less water, we need to protect water resources more systematically than before.”
