The Cavity tunnel of Egnatia Odos, where a fire broke out in a passing truck the previous night, the Deputy Minister of Infrastructure and Transport, in charge of Infrastructure Nikos, visited early on the morning of Good Friday Tahiaos, accompanied by a group of engineers from “Egnatia Odos S.A.”, led by the managing director Konstantinos Koutsoukos and according to the relevant announcement, inspected the site and then participated in a meeting with the presence of the Director of Police of Grevena Konstantinos Dina and the Traffic Commander Grevenon Constantinos Albanoglou.

After the end of the meeting, the Deputy Minister of Infrastructure stated the following:

“The occurrence of a fire in a truck inside a 1 kilometer long tunnel of Egnatia Odos is a very difficult event and in fact on a day of increased traffic in the direction of the branch the event occurred, while thousands of our fellow citizens were moving towards popular destinations of Epirus and the Ionian Islands.

Last night it proved that the effort made to maintain the highest levels of safety on Egnatia Road is paying off: Grevena Traffic Control Center operators immediately detected the incident, the predicted scenario was immediately activated, the barriers were closed and the entrance to the tunnel was blocked so that no vehicles could enter and the ventilation system was put into operation which immediately evacuated the smoke to the outside of the tunnel. Also, the mobilization of the state apparatus was, as a whole, immediate. The Police intervened immediately, the Fire Service arrived from Grevena and extinguished the fire in record time, the EKAB was mobilized and of course the service and road maintenance provider carried out the required actions to remove the truck and restore traffic through the one traffic lane. Today, since dawn, with the executives of Egnatia Street, we verified the integrity of the tunnel’s infrastructure and agreed on its full performance in operation.

I want to thank everyone who was involved in the happy ending of the event: the executives and partners of Egnatia Odos S.A. and even more so the Police and Fire Department of Grevena who demonstrated unique readiness and impeccable professionalism.

Of course, this fact cost many commuters a significant delay and of course some inconvenience. I am very sorry about this, but it was inevitable. I want to thank them for their cooperation and understanding.

Unfortunately, there are no easy alternatives to Egnatia Street in this part of Pindos. The side roads are difficult to pass, especially at night, and the walk is long. We decided with Egnatia Odos S.A. and with the assistance and approval of the Police, to prepare scenarios for immediate rerouting of the twin tunnels in the event of an incident in one of them. They are not as simple as they sound. Technical adjustments to the ventilation systems of the tunnels are required, but above all the attention, discipline and cooperation of road users, which in emergency situations, prove to be decisive.

All of us who work in the road infrastructure, all the involved services of the state sector and also the users of the network must keep in mind that what comes first is safety. At the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport, this is our priority.”