British Family Evacuated from Rhodes Hotel Finds Shelter with Local Family During Wildfires

A British family who were evacuated from their hotel in Rhodes due to wildfires have been taken in by a local family, restoring their faith in human kindness.

Caryn Savazzi from South Wales arrived on the island with her husband and two sons on Saturday, unaware that their hotel had already been evacuated.

They were taken to a school, where a local family offered them shelter.

The first repatriation flights to take Britons back home are due to arrive on the island later this week.

EasyJet will operate two rescue flights with a total of 421 seats on Monday, and a third on Tuesday, in addition to its nine scheduled flights to the Greek island.

Britons caught up in the evacuations have also begun arriving back in the UK on scheduled flights.

Authorities on Corfu have started evacuating parts of the island, which is also popular with British tourists, after wildfires spread there on Sunday.

The Foreign Office has deployed a rapid deployment team to Rhodes, along with four Red Cross workers, to assist British nationals and support travel operators in bringing people home.

Many tourists were forced to flee their hotels over the weekend as fires spread from the center of the Greek island towards its eastern coast, where many resort hotels are situated.

Some tourists ended up in other parts of the island, but with hotels at capacity, others have had to sleep on mattresses in sports halls, conference rooms, and in some cases, the street.

The situation has been dire for many tourists, with little support from travel operators.

Caryn Savazzi described the situation as a nightmare and said that tourists had been offered food, shelter, and water by local volunteers.

She said that the local couple who took her and her family in were in their early 50s and had two daughters who were traveling.

The couple thought "we've got space, let's help out." The family is now sharing the home with two other stranded families from Germany and Poland.

The Savazzi family's experience is a rare bright spot in an otherwise difficult situation for British tourists in Rhodes.

The local couple's kindness has restored their faith in human kindness, and they are not alone in their appreciation for the support they have received from locals.