Greece’s snowjob: Europe’s first climate lockdown?
Michael Nevradakis, Ph.D.
Mothers screeching, children crying, automobiles stranded in the snow. These were common sights in Athens on January 24 and 25, when the Greek capital was hit with a major snowstorm and below-freezing temperatures.
Parts of Athens received up to 50cm of snow, although the largest quantities fell in the city’s northern suburbs, far from central Athens – a point not clarified by international media who covered the storm.
Soldiers and elite forces were called in to attend to stranded drivers and passengers whose cars were trapped in the snow along major avenues and highways. An estimated 4,000 motorists were stuck in their cars, for hours or, in some instances, up to three days. However, these special forces could not clear the roads as it was impossible to bring in snow removal equipment. Instead, they distributed food, including expired pre-packaged croissants, to trapped drivers.
Most of these motorists were stranded on major Athens thoroughfares such as Mesogeion, Kifisias, and Katehaki avenues, and on the Attiki Odos beltway which circles Athens and leads to the city’s international airport. Some drivers, as well as stranded airport employees and arriving passengers, ended up camping out in the airport, with little access to food.
Lights flickered throughout the city during the storm, while some Athens suburbs went without electricity for as long as five days.
While most of the city’s roads were not cleared, with snow quickly turning to rock-solid ice, the mayor of Athens, Kostas Bakogiannis, arranged for the street in front of his mother’s central Athens home to be cleared of snow. Bakogiannis is the son of Dora Bakogianni, ex-foreign minister and sister of prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis–son of former prime minister Konstantinos Mitsotakis.
Tragi-comic scenes ensued. At a central Athens intersection, an ambulance got stuck in the snow and had to be pushed by passers-by. And in the Zografou district, a man injured after slipping in the snow needed 17 hours to reach the hospital due to impassable streets–and then was unable to return home.
Kyriakos Mitsotakis offered a televised apology, but how sincere was it? There were no resignations from the national or regional government or the Citizen Protection Service, despite heavy criticism from meteorologists, opposition parties, citizens, and even the media, typically deferential to the government and the ruling New Democracy (ND) party.
Instead, finger-pointing ensued. Mitsotakis blamed Attiki Odos management for not shutting the thoroughfare, yet it was revealed that traffic police had ordered it shut at 14:00 on the first day of snowfall. It’s unclear why these orders were not enforced.
Interior Minister Adonis Georgiadis then stated that it is the central government’s decision whether or not to close any roadway, but Giorgos Karagiannis, deputy infrastructure and transport minister, said that the decision to shut city roads rested with the regional government.
Just one day prior to the storm, regional governor Giorgos Patoulis publicly presented purportedly “gargantuan” pickup trucks equipped with ordinary snow plows, said to have cost the regional authorities €500,000. These trucks were nowhere to be seen during or after the storm. They were reportedly obtained at the last minute via no-bid contracts, as the formal tender for the region’s snow removal contract is postponed until April.
Likewise, the region has no active contract for salting the streets, and it is not to be tendered until May.
What snow removal vehicles did make it to the streets reportedly ran out of fuel.
Two representatives of the prime minister were present at the meeting where the snow removal action plan was finalized, yet the civil protection authorities for northern Athens, the region at highest risk, did not meet until the morning of the day of the storm, sans representatives of Attiki Odos.
The government also blamed meteorologists for “inaccurate” predictions, but the record demonstrated that the National Observatory correctly predicted the storm. Despite foreknowledge of the upcoming storm, a national holiday was not declared for the first day of the storm nor were any advisories issued to drivers.
Drivers themselves were also blamed. Although Attiki Odos offered individuals who were stranded €2,000 in compensation, ND MP Katerina Papakosta and former ND finance minister Stefanos Manos, who previously participated in annual Bilderberg meetings, publicly suggested that the same motorists should be fined instead.
Significantly, Attiki Odos is a private roadway, primarily owned by Greek multinational construction firms Ellaktor (65.75%) and AVAX (34.1%). Ellaktor is connected to Greek oligarch George Bobolas, but a Dutch firm, Reggeborgh, directly owns 29.85% of Ellaktor’s shares and indirectly owns an additional 9.8% through its collaboration with Atlas NV.
Some have suggested Attiki Odos sabotaged the government in a retaliatory move for not receiving €87 million in claimed damages from the government, alleging lost revenues due to the lockdowns. Nevertheless, between 2019-2021, Attiki Odos revenues exceeded €305 million, while profits in the first nine months of 2001 totaled €53 million.
Notably, foreign minister Nikos Dendias, not known as a Mitsotakis ally, is Attiki Odos’ legal representative.
Mitsotakis also laid blame on climate change, stating “[i]t is equally true, however, that the state mechanism is not yet at the point of readiness that phenomena of such great intensity require.”
But does the climate change narrative hold water? A 2008 storm dumped twice the amount of snow on Athens, without any major disruptions. A February 2021 snowstorm also did not paralyze Athens to this extent.
The Guardian, despite “criticizing” Mitsotakis, falsely claimed that Athens has only twice experienced snow of this magnitude since 1968. This ignores major snowstorms in 1987, 1991-1992, 2002, and 2004. The winter of 1991-1992 saw Athens receive 19 snowfalls. None of these snowstorms resulted in mass paralysis in Athens.
The paralysis was such that a general holiday was declared for January 25-26, during which the entire public sector and most businesses shut, while schools remained closed for the entire week. For some time, buses, trolleys, and trams ceased operating, as did courier and food delivery services.
This begs the question: was the poor response intentional, to help perpetuate specific narratives regarding the severity of the storm? More to the point, could Greece have actually experienced Europe’s first climate lockdown?
