Sudden storm soaks Skiathos on Sunday

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This video showing a Skiathos Town street flooded by yesterday’s thunderstorm was posted on YouTube by the tsak Bpam crêperie. It reminded me of television newsclips reporting on flooding from monsoons in southeast Asia. This wasn’t a scene I would expect to see on a Greek island in June!

 

 

Stormy interlude: I keep a small travel-size umbrella in my luggage just in case we encounter some rainy weather while travelling in Greece, and we have had to use it a few times. If we manage to schedule a trip to Skiathos in the near future, news about some wild weather on the island yesterday may make me consider packing some rubber boots, too.

Only two weeks ago, in my June 4 post Greek islands take spring weather woes in stride, I reported about thunderstorms that brought several days of heavy rain and strong wind to many parts of Greece at the beginning of this month.

This past Sunday afternoon, Skiathos got thoroughly drenched by a sudden deluge that dumped over an inch of rain on parts of the island in less than an hour.

 

Torrential rain, power cuts and street flooding reported

News about the latest bout of bad weather broke on the TripAdvisor.com Skiathos forum where SkiathosLover1, a TripAdvisor destination expert for the island, started a conversation thread entitled “Violent Storms … affecting the island this afternoon,” and described “torrential rain,” thunder and lightning, power dips, and “reports of flooding in Papadamatis street.” SkiathosLover1 also included a link to the YouTube video which I posted above.

Numerous people quickly posted replies expressing concern and hopes that all residents and visitors to the island were safe and minimally affected by the tempest.

This morning TA member ShaunWin chided them for “getting so worked up about yesterday’s storm.” It lasted only an hour and “was fun to watch,” he wrote, but “that was it. It’s glorious again today, with not a cloud in the sky.”

“If you’ve got friends or fans out here and are worrying about them: Don’t! They’ll be on the beach or on the beers today and not worrying about you!!” ShaunWin observed.

However, while the storm may have been fun for some to watch, SkiathosLover1 pointed out that it did cause considerable damage bringing down trees, and did frighten passengers returning to the island on tour boats.

A description of the storm’s highlights can be read a June 15 post on The Skiathan blog.

 

Skiathos street flooding

Nikos Paschalis  posted this photo on Facebook, showing stormwater rushing down Papadamatis street in Skiathos Town during the late afternoon downpour.

 

3 Comments

  1. I was planning on traveling there this summer. My heart goes out to all the people in this island. I hope no-one was hurt during the storm.

  2. ian singleton

    June 26, 2014 at 3:38 am

    We were out on a quad bike on our way back from Kastro, when in the mountains the wind picked up and the sky went black. Luckily we managed to get back to a taverna or so we thought. We were sat under cover with an open front onto the beach asking if it would be ok, they said yes, boy were they wrong. All we could see in the distance was thunder and lightning and a wall of rain coming towards us. It hit the taverna at about 50mph blowing over chairs ,tables and needless to say all the food on them. luckily nobody ws hurt and it was all taken in it`s stride although the locals were shaken. Driving back to our apartments was great fun, my wife and I in crash helmets and using bin bags for protection.
    Go on your holidays, the island is fantastic and the people are so friendly, I` m sure you wil have a great time.

  3. On the great video filmed off the Atrium ( we were guests of that Hotel ) the lady commentating said something about a little boat and wondering who was in it well I think it was my wife and I and our Norwegian friends Stig and Tone.
    Were we frightened to right we were!!! I brought the boat into Paraskevi hoping to get some shelter but as the film shows the weather Just got worse. I had to head back out to sea to get round the headland to get to Troulos But the the wind and hailstone kept pushing us to the beach.One more bay to go, would bring us to Koukounaris but visibility was down to 10 mts. I have never been so glad to see the floating pontoon bridge at Koukounaries bay I beached the boat asap and we all got out very fast and now can laugh at the adventure

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