Some 70 fire engines, 12 planes, nine helicopters and 38 water tankers were also in action to try to extinguish the blaze and to prevent it from spreading to other residential areas nearby.

Additional reinforcements, including manpower and firetrucks, from neighbouring municipalities were also dispatched to the area. Reports said one firefighter was reported injured while battling the fire in the town of Marathona.

Firefighters said the constantly changing winds would make battling the fire more difficult. In the town of Marathona, efforts to extinguish the blaze were hampered after fire officials discovered that the main water pipes linking to fire pumps had been severed.

'We see the fire approaching but it is too late to escape - we are trapped,' a monk trapped in the Zogohos Piggis Monastery in Rodopis was heard saying on national television via telephone.

Reports said the fire had already destroyed thousands of acres of forest and olives groves and at least a dozen homes were damaged in the fire. Panicked people rushed around to save their property despite warnings from fire officials to evacuate the area.

In an effort to avoid an explosion, emergency forces removed munitions from an army base located in Varnava.

Firefighting officials said more than 100 forest fires were reported to have broken out across the country in less than 24 hours, fuelled by high temperatures and winds.

Three blazes were also reported to be burning out of control on the Ionian island of Zakynthos, scorching nearly 2,000 acres of forest. Other fires were reported on the eastern Greek islands of Evia, Skyros, the eastern town of Nafplion, Corinth and the Dodenannese island of Rhodes.

Forest fires have become more frequent in Greece in recent summers, triggered by high temperatures and drought but also arson.