The floods, which followed storms Daniel and Elias in autumn, caused around 20,000 hectares (50,000 acres) of plains in Thessaly to flood, refilling a nearby lake that had been drained in 1962 to combat malaria.
The lake expanded to three times its normal size. According to Dimitris Klaudatos, a professor of agriculture and environment at the University of Thessaly, freshwater fish were carried by rivers to the sea during these floods.
As the lake's water levels have since dropped significantly, these freshwater fish were pushed toward the Volos port, which empties into the Pagasetic Gulf and the Aegean Sea—environments in which they cannot survive.
On Tuesday alone, authorities removed 57 tons of dead fish from beaches near Volos, and cleanup operations continued on Wednesday. The local association of restaurants and bars reported that tourist traffic to the area has already fallen by nearly 80% since the flooding last year.
Stefanos Stefanou, president of the association, expressed concern: "The situation with this dead fish will be the death of us. What visitor will come to our city after this?"
Local authorities have launched an investigation to analyze water quality and microbial levels in the estuary of Lake Karla, as well as potential pollution in the gulf.
