The UK has had its hottest summer on record, the Met Office has said, after the country faced four heatwaves in a single season.
The
mean temperature for meteorological summer, which encompasses the
months of June, July and August, was 16.1C (60.98F), which is
significantly above the current record of 15.76C set in 2018.
All
five of the hottest summers on record have now occurred since 2000 – a
clear signal of the global heating that scientists say is resulting from
increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
The
Met Office said it had conducted a rapid analysis that found the
record-breaking summer temperatures had been made about 70 times more
likely because of human-induced climate change.
Dr Mark McCarthy, the agency’s head of climate attribution, said: “In a
natural climate, we could expect to see a summer like 2025 with an
approximate return period of around 340 years, while in the current
climate we could expect to see these sorts of summers roughly one in
every five years.
“Our analysis suggests that while 2025 has set a
new record, we could plausibly experience much hotter summers in our
current and near-future climate and shows how what would have been seen
as extremes in the past are becoming more common in our changing
climate.”
The latest record beats the last by a
wide margin. This year’s average temperature was just over a third of a
degree hotter than 2018’s previous record, while temperatures for the
other four of the five hottest summers on record differed by just
hundredths of a degree. Overall the mean temperature was 1.51C above the
long-term meteorological average.
June and
July had hot weather, with four heatwaves including days above 30C.
There has been very little rain across much of the country, with England
experiencing what the government has called “nationally significant”
water shortfalls. Much of England is under a hosepipe ban as reservoirs,
rivers and groundwater run dry.
Although
the summer has been consistently warm, there has not been extreme heat.
The highest temperature recorded to date for 2025 was 35.8C in
Faversham, Kent, on 1 July, well short of the UK’s all-time high of
40.3C, set in July 2022.
But in June alone
there were two heatwaves, making it the hottest June on record for
England and the second hottest for the UK overall. A third heatwave in
July and a fourth in August pushed the overall average temperature for
the summer into record-breaking territory.
Towards the end of June, scientists calculated that the heat endured by people in the south-east of England had been made 100 times more likely by the climate crisis.
Meteorologists have said this year’s consistent warmth was driven by dry ground from spring, high-pressure systems, and unusually warm seas around the UK, and minimum temperatures had been exceptionally above average.
The
Met Office scientist Dr Emily Carlisle said: “These conditions have
created an environment where heat builds quickly and lingers, with both
maximum and minimum temperatures considerably above average,.”
New modelling suggests the tipping point that makes an Amoc shutdown inevitable is likely to be passed within a few decades. Photograph: Henrik Egede-Lassen/Zoomedia/PA
The collapse of a critical Atlantic current can
no longer be considered a low-likelihood event, a study has concluded,
making deep cuts to fossil fuel emissions even more urgent to avoid the
catastrophic impact.
The Atlantic meridional
overturning circulation (Amoc) is a major part of the global climate
system. It brings sun-warmed tropical water to Europe and the Arctic,
where it cools and sinks to form a deep return current. The Amoc was
already known to be at its weakest in 1,600 years as a result of the climate crisis.
Climate models recently indicated that a collapse before 2100 was unlikely
but the new analysis examined models that were run for longer, to 2300
and 2500. These show the tipping point that makes an Amoc shutdown
inevitable is likely to be passed within a few decades, but that the
collapse itself may not happen until 50 to 100 years later.
The research found that if carbon emissions
continued to rise, 70% of the model runs led to collapse, while an
intermediate level of emissions resulted in collapse in 37% of the
models. Even in the case of low future emissions, an Amoc shutdown
happened in 25% of the models.
Scientists have warned previously that Amoc collapse must be avoided “at all costs”.
It would shift the tropical rainfall belt on which many millions of
people rely to grow their food, plunge western Europe into extreme cold
winters and summer droughts, and add 50cm to already rising sea levels.
The new results are “quite shocking, because I
used to say that the chance of Amoc collapsing as a result of global
warming was less than 10%”, said Prof Stefan Rahmstorf, at the Potsdam
Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, who was part of the
study team. “Now even in a low-emission scenario, sticking to the Paris
agreement, it looks like it may be more like 25%.
“These
numbers are not very certain, but we are talking about a matter of risk
assessment where even a 10% chance of an Amoc collapse would be far too
high. We found that the tipping point where the shutdown becomes
inevitable is probably in the next 10 to 20 years or so. That is quite a
shocking finding as well and why we have to act really fast in cutting
down emissions.”
Scientists spotted warning signs of a tipping point
in 2021 and know that the Amoc has collapsed in the Earth’s past.
“Observations in the deep [far North Atlantic] already show a downward
trend over the past five to 10 years, consistent with the models’
projections,” said Prof Sybren Drijfhout, at the Royal Netherlands
Meteorological Institute, who was also part of the team.
“Even
in some intermediate and low-emission scenarios, the Amoc slows
drastically by 2100 and completely shuts off thereafter. That shows the
shutdown risk is more serious than many people realise.”
The study, published in the journal Environmental Research Letters,
analysed the standard models used by the Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change (IPCC). The scientists were particularly concerned to
find that in many models the tipping point is reached in the next decade
or two, after which the shutdown of the Amoc becomes inevitable owing
to a self-amplifying feedback.
Air
temperatures are rising rapidly in the Arctic because of the climate
crisis, meaning the ocean cools more slowly there. Warmer water is less
dense and therefore sinks into the depths more slowly. This slowing
allows more rainfall to accumulate in the salty surface waters, also
making it less dense, and further slowing the sinking, forming the
feedback loop. Another new study, using a different approach, also found the tipping point is probably going to be reached around the middle of this century.
Only some of the IPCC models have been run beyond
2100, so the researchers also looked to see which of those running to
the end of this century showed Amoc was already in terminal decline.
This produced the 70%, 37% and 25% figures. The scientists concluded:
“Such numbers no longer comply with the low-likelihood-high-impact event
that is used to discuss an abrupt Amoc collapse in [the IPCC’s last
report].”
Dr Aixue Hu at the Global Climate Dynamics Laboratory in Colorado, US, who was not part of the study team, saidthe
results were important. “But it is still very uncertain when Amoc
collapse will happen or when the Amoc tipping point is going to crossed
because of the lack of direct observations [of the ocean] and the
varying results from the models.”
The study
that found that a total collapse of the Amoc was unlikely this century
was led by Dr Jonathan Baker at the Met Office Hadley Centre in the UK.
“This new study highlights that the risk rises after 2100,” he said.
“[But] these percentages should be treated with caution – the sample
size is small, so more simulations [beyond 2100] are needed to better
quantify the risk.”
Nonetheless, Baker said,
“the ocean is already changing, and projected shifts in North Atlantic
convection are a real concern. Even if a collapse is unlikely, a major
weakening is expected, and that alone could have serious impacts on
Europe’s climate in the decades to come. But the future of the Atlantic
circulation is still in our hands.”
Melting is likely to start again at about double the long-term rate in the next five to 10 years, the scientists said. Photograph: Keren Su/China Span/Alamy
The melting of sea ice in the Arctic
has slowed dramatically in the past 20 years, scientists have reported,
with no statistically significant decline in its extent since 2005.
The
finding is surprising, the researchers say, given that carbon emissions
from fossil fuel burning have continued to rise and trap ever more heat
over that time.
They
said natural variations in ocean currents that limit ice melting had
probably balanced out the continuing rise in global temperatures.
However, they said this was only a temporary reprieve and melting was
highly likely to start again at about double the long-term rate at some
point in the next five to 10 years.
The findings do not mean Arctic sea ice is rebounding. Sea ice
area in September, when it reaches its annual minimum, has halved since
1979, when satellite measurements began. The climate crisis remains
“unequivocally real”, the scientists said, and the need for urgent
action to avoid the worst impacts remains unchanged.
The natural variation causing the slowdown is probably the multi-decadal
fluctuations in currents in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, which
change the amount of warmed water flowing into the Arctic. The Arctic is
still expected to see ice-free conditions later in the century, harming
people and wildlife in the region and boosting global heating by
exposing the dark, heat-absorbing ocean.
Dr Mark England, who led the study while at the
University of Exeter, said: “It is surprising, when there is a current
debate about whether global warming is accelerating, that we’re talking
about a slowdown.
“The good news is that 10 to
15 years ago when sea ice loss was accelerating, some people were
talking about an ice-free Arctic before 2020. But now the [natural]
variability has switched to largely cancelling out sea ice loss. It has
bought us a bit more time but it is a temporary reprieve – when it ends,
it isn’t good news.”
The research, published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters,
used two different datasets of Arctic sea ice levels from 1979 to the
present day. The scientists analysed the sea ice area for every month of
the year and the slowdown was seen in all cases.
To
see if such a slowdown could be a result of natural variation, they
examined the results of thousands of climate model runs. “This is not an
extremely rare event – over a century, it should happen a couple of
times,” said England, now at the University of California, Irvine.
Furthermore, all the simulations showed sea ice loss accelerating again
after the slowdown.
Prof Julienne Stroeve, of
University College London, said: “We know climate records, be it in
global temperatures or sea ice, can remain the same for several years in
a row as a result of internal climate variability.”
Stroeve’s
analysis of the long-term trend from 1979 to 2024 shows that about 2.5
sq metres of September ice is lost for every tonne of CO2 emitted.
Prof Andrew Shepherd, of Northumbria University,
said: “We know that the Arctic sea ice pack is also thinning, and so
even if the area was not reducing, the volume still is. Our data show
that since 2010 the average October thickness has fallen by 0.6cm per
year.”
The rate of the rise in global surface
temperature has also slowed down in the past, before resuming a rapid
rise. A major El Niño event in 1998 was followed by a decade or so of
similar global temperatures, which was nicknamed “the pause”. However,
the planet continued to accumulate heat throughout and global
temperatures have since risen rapidly.
England
rejected any suggestion the sea ice slowdown suggested climate change
was not real. “Climate change is unequivocally real, human-driven, and
continues to pose serious threats. The fundamental science and urgency
for climate action remain unchanged,” he said.
“It
is good to explain to people that [the slowdown] is happening, else
they are going to hear it from someone who is trying to use it in bad
faith as a way to undermine our very solid understanding of what’s
happening with climate change.”
Extreme temperatures exacerbated by carbon pollution fuel fires in southern Europe as green policies are rolled back
Relentless heat and raging wildfires continue to ravage southern Europe,
with one-quarter of weather stations in Spain recording 40C
temperatures, as the prime minister urged people to “leave the climate
emergency outside of partisan struggles”.
The
Spanish weather agency Aemet recorded a high of 45.8C in Cádiz on
Sunday, while one in eight weather stations nationwide hit peaks of at
least 42C (108F) . The agency warned of “very high or extreme fire
danger” in most of the country in a post on social media on Monday.
“Although
the heatwave is starting to subside, very high temperatures will still
be reached today in the east and south of the peninsula,” it said. “Be
cautious.”
A pyrocumulus cloud swells over Vilarmel village during a fire in the Galicia region of Spain. Photograph: Mikel Konate/Reuters
Deadly fires have burned 348,000 hectares in Spain
this year, according to preliminary data published by Copernicus on
Monday, charring even more land than when the previous record was set in
2022.
A fourth person was killed by the fires in Spain
when a firefighting truck overturned on a steep forest road, while in
neighbouring Portugal, which has also had extreme heat, another
firefighter died, bringing the national death toll to two. Civil
protection authorities said 31,130 people have been evacuated from their
homes in the last week.
The Spanish
government said on Sunday that an extra 500 soldiers would join the
1,400 troops trying to bring deadly wildfires under control. The prime
minister, Pedro Sánchez, announced a “state pact” to tackle the climate
emergency as he visited Ourense and León, one of the regions engulfed by
flames.
“We need a strategy that anticipates a better,
more secure and more equitable response for our fellow citizens in the
face of the worsening and accelerating effects of the climate emergency
in our country,” Sánchez said. “And that requires a great state pact
that leaves the climate emergency outside of partisan struggles and
ideological issues, where we focus on scientific evidence and act
accordingly.”
Sánchez’s proposed pact received
a dismissive response from the opposition conservative People’s party
(PP), which has called for more troop deployments and accused the prime
minister of absenting himself from the crisis.
“State pacts don’t put out the flames, nor do
they restore what’s been lost,” said Ester Muñoz, a PP spokesperson.
“People were expecting a lot more than a smokescreen designed to save
his reputation after he’d gone missing for a week.”
Extreme
heat, made hotter by carbon pollution, has fuelled devastating
wildfires across southern Europe this month, the latest in a series of
disasters exacerbated by climate breakdown amid a continental rollback
of green policies.
Data from last week shows
the blazes have burned at least 530,000 hectares this year, more than
double the average over the past two decades, forcing several
overwhelmed governments from Spain to Bulgaria to seek firefighting help
from the EU. Portugal activated the EU’s civil protection mechanism on Friday with a request for four Canadair water-bombing planes.
The prolonged heatwave has broken temperature records across the
continent. It is expected to die down in Spain after Monday and subsided
in some countries over the weekend.
Météo France, the French national weather agency,
said temperatures had fallen on Sunday but the wildfire risk remained
high or very high in several southern regions.
“The
Mediterranean and south-western departments of the country are
experiencing significant drought, which means that vegetation is highly
sensitive to fire,” the agency said on Monday. It added that the rise in
daytime temperatures had been limited by smoke from the Spanish and
Portuguese wildfires, as well as plumes of Saharan sand.
In
Portugal, which has been under a state of alert since the start of the
month, large rural fires have killed two people and caused several
injuries.
The head of a dead fish lies in the almost-dry Aume riverbed in Saint-Fraigne, France. Photograph: Yohan Bonnet/AP
The minister for internal affairs, Maria Lúcia
Amaral, extended the wildfire alert on Sunday until Tuesday night but
left a press conference when journalists tried to ask questions,
Portuguese media reported. André Ventura, the head of the far-right
Chega party, called for her resignation. “We are reaching the limit of
what is acceptable,” he said on Sunday.
In
a radio interview on Monday morning, Spain’s defence minister,
Margarita Robles, said the fires were unlikely to be brought under
control until the heatwave ended later on Monday. “We’re not going to be
able to end this situation until the heatwave dies down,” Robles told
Cadena Ser. “We’re seeing fires with different characteristics because
of climate change.”
A woman flees as a forest fire gathers pace in Pampilhosa da Serra, Portugal. Photograph: Paulo Cunha/EPA
She said the Military Emergencies Unit (UME), founded to help deal with
disasters, had never faced such challenging conditions. “We’re seeing a
fire situation that’s never been seen before. The UME hasn’t seen
anything like this since it was established 20 years ago.”
A
timelapse view from cameras monitored by the U.S.G.S. of the Suicide
Basin before the glacial lake outburst flooding from the Mendenhall
Glacier, in Juneau, Alaska, covering a period from July 21 to Aug. 13.CreditCredit...U.S.G.S.
An overflowing
glacial lake north of Juneau, Alaska, caused the Mendenhall River to
surge to a record height on Wednesday, flooding homes and streets in
parts of the state capital, which has a population of more than 30,000.
Such
floods have been a recurring problem in Juneau since 2011, but recent
years have seen record-setting surges as rising temperatures cause
glaciers in the area to melt more rapidly. Alaska has warmed faster than
the global average, and the fastest of any state, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
Flooding last August from the same glacial lake
inundated several hundred homes in Juneau with four to six feet of
water, although no deaths or injuries were reported. The city put up a
temporary levee along the river in response. Residents this week were
urged to evacuate ahead of the latest round of high water.
Here’s what to know about these floods.
What’s a glacial lake outburst flood, or GLOF?
As
glaciers melt, they tend to retreat uphill, leaving an empty bowl at
the bottom of the valley where the ice once sat. Meltwater from the
glacier starts pooling in this bowl, and over time a lake forms.
But the sides of the lake are fragile. They might be formed of loose
dirt and rock or ice. If one day an avalanche or a landslide occurs, or a
piece of a nearby cliff plunges into the water, the disturbance can
cause the sides of the lake to collapse. In a flash, most of the lake’s
water might cascade down the valley, threatening towns and cities below.
Glacial
lake outburst floods can be catastrophic because, by the time the water
reaches downstream settlements, it has picked up huge amounts of
sediment and boulders along the way, turning it into a thick slurry that
can knock down buildings.
In 2023, a GLOF in northern India
killed at least 55 people and destroyed a hydropower dam. All in all,
15 million people around the world live within 50 kilometers, or 31
miles, of a glacial lake and less than a kilometer from the potential
path of a GLOF, scientists estimated in a 2023 study.
How common are they in Alaska?
The
glacial lake that is overflowing this week in Alaska sits at the foot
of the Suicide Glacier, an ice mass north of Juneau. Decades ago, the
Suicide Glacier flowed into a much larger river of ice, the Mendenhall
Glacier. But as the Suicide melts and shrinks, a steep gap has opened up
between it and the Mendenhall. This gap is now called Suicide Basin.
(Experts
have proposed renaming Suicide Basin to Kʼóox Ḵaadí Basin, which in the
Tlingit language translates to “Marten’s Slide Basin.” A marten is a
lithe, weasel-like animal found in the area.)
Snowmelt
and rain accumulate in the basin, and when the water is high enough, it
starts draining through cracks in the Mendenhall Glacier before
flooding the Mendenhall River.
The
first time this happened was in July 2011, and it took downstream
communities by surprise. The basin has since filled and drained at least
39 times, according to the National Weather Service. Early Wednesday,
as the basin drained once more, the Mendenhall River peaked at a height
of 16.65 feet, exceeding a record set last year.
The
glaciers in this region are part of the Juneau Ice Field, a sprawling
area of interconnected ice that is melting twice as quickly as it did
before 2010, scientists reported last year.
More of the area’s glaciers are detaching from one another, the
researchers also found, which can lead to the formation of lakes like
Suicide Basin.
Accelerated melting is
producing more water to fill these lakes and hence more water that
eventually floods neighborhoods downstream, said Bob McNabb, a
glaciologist at Ulster University who has studied the Juneau Ice Field.
“As you get more and more melting coming down, that will fill up the
basin a bit more each time,” Dr. McNabb said.
How is climate change affecting GLOFs?
The
world’s high mountains are warming more quickly than Earth as a whole.
That is causing thousands of glaciers to shrink and new lakes to form
beneath them. Since 1990, the number, area and volume of glacial lakes
around the world have all grown by roughly 50 percent, scientists estimated in a 2020 study.
But
bigger lakes don’t directly translate into greater GLOF hazards. Each
glacial lake and valley has distinct features that influence how likely
it is to burst, and what the consequences would be if it did. So
predicting future flood risks is “very complex,” Dr. McNabb said.
In
the Mendenhall Valley, for instance, rising temperatures are the reason
the Suicide Glacier has withered away and Suicide Basin has formed. But
as the planet warms further, the Mendenhall Glacier might melt by so
much that the flood threat actually decreases. The reason? There would
no longer be enough ice at the side of Suicide Basin to trap large
amounts of meltwater. Instead, the water would just empty into the
valley gradually.
Scientists in Alaska have predicted
that this could come to pass within the next decade or two. Until then,
the people of Juneau will continue to live with the dangers from the
warming landscape just a few miles to their north.
The heatwave-fuelled wildfires
that have killed two people in Spain over recent days, devouring
thousands of hectares of land and forcing thousands of people from their
homes, are a “clear warning” of the impact of the climate emergency,
the country’s environment minister has said.
Speaking on Wednesday morning, as firefighters in Spain, Greece
and other Mediterranean countries continued to battle dozens of blazes,
Sara Aagesen said the 14 wildfires still burning across seven Spanish
regions were further proof of the country’s particular vulnerability to
global heating.
Aagesen said that while some
of the fires appeared to have been started deliberately, the deadly
blazes were a clear indicator of the climate emergency and of the need
for better preparation and prevention.
“The
fires are one of the parts of the impact of that climate change, which
is why we have to do all we can when it comes to prevention,” she told Cadena Ser radio.
“Our
country is especially vulnerable to climate change. We have resources
now but, given that the scientific evidence and the general expectation
point to it having an ever greater impact, we need to work to reinforce
and professionalise those resources.”
Firefighters on the outskirts of Abejera de Tábara, Zamora, Spain. Photograph: Susana Vera/Reuters
Aagesen’s comments came a day after temperatures in parts of southern Spain
surged past 45C (113F). The state meteorological office, Aemet, said
there were no recorded precedents for the temperatures experienced
between 1 August and 20 August.
A 35-year-old volunteer firefighter died on
Tuesday in the north-western Spanish region of Castilla y León, where
fires have prompted the evacuation of more than 8,000 residents, and
where seven people are being treated in hospital for serious burns. Four
are in a critical condition.
The
firefighter’s death came hours after that of a 50-year-old man who
suffered 98% burns while trying to save horses from a burning stable
near Madrid on Monday night.
By Wednesday
morning, the Madrid fire had been brought under control, but blazes in
the far north-western region Galicia had consumed 11,500 hectares
(30,000 acres) of land by the end of the day.
“Emergency
teams are continuing to fight fires across our country,” the prime
minister, Pedro Sánchez, said in a post on X on Wednesday. “The fire
situation remains serious and extreme caution is essential. My thanks,
once again, to all of you who are working tirelessly to fight the
flames.”
A helicopter flies over the town of Vilar near Chandrexa de Queixa in Galicia, Spain, on Tuesday. Photograph: Brais Lorenzo/EPA
Neighbouring Portugal deployed more than 2,100
firefighters and 20 aircraft against five big blazes, with efforts
focused on a fire in the central municipality of Trancoso that has raged
since Saturday.
Strong gusts of wind had
rekindled flames overnight and threatened nearby villages, where
television images showed local people volunteering to help firefighters
under a thick cloud of smoke.
In Greece, which
requested EU aerial assistance on Tuesday, close to 5,000 firefighters
were battling blazes fanned by gale-force winds nationwide. Authorities
said emergency workers were waging a “a titanic battle” to douse flames
still raging through the western Peloponnese, in Epirus farther north,
and on the islands of Zakynthos, Kefalonia and Chios, where thousands of
residents and tourists have been evacuated from homes and hotels.
Local
media reported the wildfires had decimated houses, farms and factories
and forced people to flee. Fifteen firefighters and two volunteers had
suffered burns and other injuries including “symptoms of heatstroke”,
the fire service said.
A man moves goats during a wildfire in Vounteni, on the outskirts of Patras, Greece, on Wednesday. Photograph: Thanassis Stavrakis/AP
Around midnight a huge blaze erupted on Chios, devouring land that had only begun to recover from devastating wildfires in June. As the flames reached the shores, the coastguard rushed to remove people on boats to safety.
On
the other side of Greece, outside the western city of Patras,
volunteers with the Hellenic Red Cross struggled to contain infernos
barrelling towards villages and towns. By lunchtime on Wednesday, media
footage showed flames on the outskirts of Patras, Greece’s third-largest
city. Municipal authorities announced a shelter had been set up to
provide refuge, food and water for those in need.
Officials
evacuated a children’s hospital and a retirement home in the city as a
precaution, and local media footage showed the roof of a 17th-century
monastery outside the city on fire.
Seventeen settlements around Preveza, where fires broke out Tuesday, were reported to be without electricity or water.
“Today
is also expected to be very difficult as in most areas of the country a
very high risk of fire is forecast,” a fire service spokesperson,
Vassilis Vathrakoyiannis, said in a televised address. “By order of the
head of the fire brigade, all services nationwide, including civil
protection forces, will be in a state of alert.”
Firefighters take a quick rest in Izmir, Turkey, on Wednesday. Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images
At first light, 33 water-dumping planes and helicopters scrambled to extinguish fires, he said.
Temperatures
exceeding 35C (95F) are predicted, according to some meteorologists, to
rise further later this week, the height of the summer for Greeks.
Record heat and prolonged drought have already turned much of the
country tinder-dry, producing conditions ripe for forest fires.
A forestry worker was killed on Wednesday while responding to a wildfire in southern Turkey,
officials said. The forestry ministry said the worker died in an
accident involving a fire truck that left four others injured.
Turkey has been battling severe wildfires since late June. A total of 18 people have been killed, including 10 rescue volunteers and forestry workers who died in July.
In southern Albania
a wildfire caused explosions after detonating buried second world
war-era artillery shells. Officials said on Wednesday an 80-year-old man
had died in one blaze south of the capital, Tirana.
The Associated Press and Agence France-Presse contributed to this report
The deadly heatwave fanning wildfires across the
Mediterranean region has claimed at least three lives and forced
thousands of people from their homes.
Firefighters
continued to battle blazes on Tuesday and authorities braced for
further damage as temperatures in some areas surged well past 40C. In Spain,
a Romanian man in his 50s died after suffering 98% burns while trying
to rescue horses from a burning stable near Madrid on Monday night.
A
four-year-old boy who was found unconscious in his family’s car in
Sardinia died in Rome on Monday after suffering irreversible brain
damage caused by heatstroke. And in Montenegro, one soldier died and
another was seriously injured when their water tanker overturned while
fighting wildfires in the hills north of the capital, Podgorica, on
Tuesday.
Scientist have warned that the heat currently affecting large parts of Europe is creating perfect conditions for wildfires and serving as another reminder of the climate emergency.
“Thanks to climate change, we now live in a
significantly warmer world,” Akshay Deoras, a research scientist at the
University of Reading’s meteorology department told Agence
France-Presse, adding that “many still underestimate the danger”.
The
fire in Tres Cantos, near Madrid – which had been fuelled by winds of
70km/h (45mph) and which has devoured 1,000 hectares of land – was still
not under control on Tuesday evening, when further strong gusts were
expected. The regional government said it had recovered 150 dead sheep
and 18 dead horses from the area.
More than
3,700 people were evacuated from 16 municipalities amid dozens of
reported blazes in the north-western region of Castilla y León,
including one that damaged the Unesco world heritage-listed Roman-era
mining site at Les Médulas.
Authorities in
neighbouring Galicia said the largest wildfire of the year had burned
through 3,000 hectares of land in Ourense province. In the southern town
of Tarifa, firefighters on the ground and in planes battled a fire that
broke out on Monday, with 2,000 people evacuated.
The blazes have led the interior ministry to declare a “pre-emergency phase” to help coordinate emergency resources.
Firefighters work to extinguish a forest fire in Lamas de Olo, in the Alvao natural park, Portugal. Photograph: Pedro Sarmento Costa/EPA
The prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, offered his condolences to the family
of the man who died after the Tres Cantos fire, and thanked the
emergency services for their “tireless efforts”.
He urged people to recognise the seriousness of
the situation. “We’re at extreme risk of forest fires,” he said in a
message on X on Tuesday. “Let’s be very careful.”
In neighbouring Portugal, firefighters were battling three large wildfires in the centre and north of the country.
Authorities
in Greece requested EU help as fires, fuelled by gale force winds,
ripped across vast swathes of the western Peloponnese and emergency
services ordered the evacuation of thousands of residents.
Firefighters
were also trying to contain blazes on the popular Ionian tourist
islands of Zakynthos and Kefalonia. With gusts hampering firefighting
efforts, emergency services ordered all hotels in the region of Agala
and Keri on Zakynthos to temporarily close, forcing suitcase-wielding
holidaymakers to flee and relocate to other areas.
A house burning during a wildfire that erupted in a forest near the village of Agalas on Zakynthos. Photograph: Costas Synetos/EPA
By late Tuesday, dozens of firefighters,
supported by 15 fire trucks and eight water-bombing planes and
helicopters, were still trying to douse the fast-moving flames.
“Everything
that civil protection can offer is here but there are very strong winds
and the fires are out of control,” said the island’s mayor, Giorgos
Stasinopoulos. “We need a lot more air support, it’s vital.”
The
fire service said it was also dealing with blazes farther north in
Epirus, around Preveza and in the central region of Aetolia-Acarnania.
Despite
temperatures nudging 43C in some parts of the Peloponnese region of
southern Greece on Tuesday – and the prolonged drought, which has
produced highly flammable conditions on tinder-dry soil – officials
described the outbreak of so many fires as “suspiciously high”.
Faced
with an estimated 63 blazes erupting and firefighters confronting
flames on 106 fronts, fire officers dispatched specialist teams to
several of the stricken regions to investigate possible arson.
In Albania,
hundreds of firefighters and troops had subdued most of the nearly 40
fires that flared up in the past 24 hours, the defence ministry said,
but more than a dozen were still active.
Since
the start of July, nearly 34,000 hectares have been scorched
nationwide, according to the European Forest Fire Information System.
Police say many of the blazes were deliberate, with more than 20 people
arrested.
The aftermath of the blaze in Çanakkale, Turkey, on Tuesday. Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images
In Croatia, about 150 firefighters spent Monday night defending homes near the port city of Split.
In
the north-western Turkish province of Çanakkale, more than 2,000 people
were evacuated and 77 people treated in hospital for smoke inhalation
after fires broke out near the tourist village of Güzelyalı, authorities
said.
Images on Turkish media showed homes
and cars ablaze, while more than 760 firefighters, 10 planes, nine
helicopters and more than 200 vehicles were deployed to battle the
flames. Turkey this year experienced its hottest July since records began 55 years ago.
In
southern France, where temperature records were broken in at least four
weather stations, the government called for vigilance.
The
south-western city of Bordeaux hit a record 41.6C on Monday, while
all-time records were broken at meteorological stations in Bergerac,
Cognac and Saint Girons, according to the national weather service,
Météo France.
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