I’m standing watching a helicopter scoop water out of the Ionian Sea and dump it onto flames being blown down the steep slopes of northeast Corfu towards a school and villas below.

Its bucket can carry several tonnes of water and while it might protect the buildings for now, force 7 winds forecast soon are likely to give the fire the upper hand.

Watching with me is the local deputy mayor for tourism Haris Yiotis. He’s worried that if the fires aren’t out by then homes and crucial infrastructure on the island will be lost.

“I’m 60 years old,” he tells me, “I’ve never seen a fire such as this.

“I will class it as the fire of the century for Corfu.”

As if to drive that point home, a little way up the road 100-year-old olive trees are burning from the inside.

The heat is so great I can only get within a few metres.

‘The hotel burned down’: Grandmother who thought she was going to die among angry tourists stranded in Rhodes

Europe weather: Highest temperatures yet to come as tourists left stranded outside Greek landmark

Cerberus heatwave: European data shows land temperatures are scorching – and it’s about to get much worse

The air is thick with the smell of smoke, and wood fire dampened by aerial bombardment with water.

While wildfires aren’t caused by climate change, the extremes of heat that are, make events like this more likely.

What might have once been a rare heatwave in southern Europe, is now, according to the latest analysis by World Weather Attribution, likely to occur every decade.

Deputy mayor Yiotis is concerned about what climate change means for Corfu and other Greek Islands.

Their climate is becoming “more like Dubai” in decades to come.

He’s surprised but encouraged by young people on Corfu who have volunteered to staff roadblocks and ferry water to firefighters.

The same young people who will have to figure out how their island will adapt to more frequent extremes.

Average temperatures in Greece are edging gradually upwards – as they are pretty much everywhere else – and pushing out the extremes of weather too.

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

Read more:
Two dead as plane fighting Greece wildfires crashes
Scientists warn deadly extreme heat ‘rapidly on the rise’

A ‘human hand’ contributing to the fires?

But not everyone here accepts the changing climate is really responsible for the situation.

Vasilis Sofitsis, who runs a pool and garden firm on the island, points out arsonists are suspected of starting these fires.

“There’s a human hand in this,” he tells me.

There are just too many fire fronts in too many different places, he argues, to have occurred by accident.

And he may be right.

Be the first to get Breaking News

Install the Sky News app for free

But no one is arguing climate change starts fires. Just that it can turbo-charge heatwaves that create the conditions which favour them.

And as a TV reporter, I have to be honest that the fires burning across Europe are the type of disaster that’s easily captured on TV news. Emblematic of climate extremes, but their causes more complicated than that.

But should we treat wildfires just as weather events, and risk losing sight of the less visible, insidious climatic shifts going on around the world?

And even with our rapidly changing climate, weather will still fluctuate.

Heatwaves and the impacts they have will come and go.

But the point here is, they’re going to keep coming more often, and going more slowly, unless we do something about it.

Related posts:

Anger over reports UK to cut Yemen aid with masses of children on ‘brink of famine’ ‘Psychological torture and self-isolation’ – life inside Alexei Navalny’s prison Severed heads and inactive grenades thrown in polling stations during violent Mexico elections Indian PM offers free vaccines for all adults, as lockdown eases in some states after cases fall Nearly half of Miss Mexico contestants test positive for COVID-19 Winners and runners-up from the 10th National Geographic Traveller photography competition revealed ‘You are a criminal, I will kill you’: China is using black sites in the UAE as they target Uyghurs abroad US warship fires warning flare at Iranian speedboat during tense encounter Monkeypox declared global heath emergency, as risk in Europe described as ‘high’ Failure to act on climate is a ‘collective suicide pact’, UN chief tells world leaders ‘We need more of everything’: Ukrainian soldiers demand extra Western weapons to defend Bakhmut Putin critic Navalny possibly ‘being poisoned’ in prison, spokesperson suggests