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,.”
An energy company seeking to hike utility bills in New York City
by 11% disconnected more than 88,000 households during the first six
months of 2025, signaling a crackdown on families struggling to cover
rising energy costs even as the climate crisis drives extreme
temperatures.
Con Edison, the monopoly utility
that provides electricity to 3.6m homes across the country’s largest
city and neighboring Westchester county, disconnected almost 2.5% of all
its customers between January and June this year – triple the total
number of families left without power in 2024. One in five disconnected
homes remain without power for at least a week.
The
utility shut off 16,327 households in the month leading up to 25 June.
New York was hit by its first heatwave between 23 and 25 June, breaking
daytime and night-time records in Central Park and driving a surge in emergency room visits.
A construction crew from a ConEdison electric
repair team continues road work in the Chinatown neighborhood of New
York on 15 February 2025. Photograph: Robert Nickelsberg/Getty Images
New York is among the most expensive places for
electricity, with families shouldering above-inflation price hikes in
recent years on top of unaffordable housing and the broader cost of
living crisis stemming from the Covid pandemic.
In the past five years, more than 40% of New
Yorkers have fallen into arrears, and 23% of households were
disconnected at least once – leaving families without access to a
fridge, internet, cooking facilities and heat or cooling until they can
find the money to pay for reconnection.
Black
and Latino New Yorkers are more than twice as likely as white residents
to fall behind, and almost eight times more likely to have a utility
shutoff, according to the 2024 Poverty Tracker/Robin Hood report on energy insecurity.
“Disconnection
is an effective cost recovery strategy but it’s also completely
inhumane. It’s traumatizing for families and costs some people their
lives,” said Diana Hernandez, co-author of the report and associate
professor of sociomedical sciences at Columbia University.
“People want to pay their bills but they are unaffordable for too many families.”
People walk across the Brooklyn Bridge on a
day where the heat index is expected to top 100 degrees Fahrenheit in
New York on 25 July 2025. Photograph: Spencer Platt/Getty Images
Almost 16% of New York homes – one in six Con Edison residential
customers – were behind on their energy bills at the end of 2024, with
debts totaling $948m, according to data submitted by the utility to the
state regulator.
But as Con Edison ramped up disconnections over
the past six months, the debt fell to $840m by the end of June with
12.5% of New Yorkers now behind on their bills.
At
the current rate, Con Edison could disconnect 150,000 households by the
end of the year, the highest number by any utility in the country,
according to Mark Wolfe, an energy economist.
“Energy
is unaffordable so people fall behind. The disconnection numbers show
that Con Edison is aggressively cracking down, and life is going to
become harder for poor people in New York,” said Wolfe, executive
director of the National Energy Assistance Directors Association
(Neada).
Researchers at Neada, the organization for state directors of the federally funded Low Income Home Energy
Assistance Program (Liheap), collated the debt and disconnection
figures submitted to the New York Public Services Commission, the
regulator.
There is no demographic breakdown
but people of color, households with children, renters in small
buildings, and people with pre-existing medical conditions who rely on
electronic devices such as oxygen dispensers, as well as Bronx residents
are all more likely to experience energy poverty and therefore a
disconnection, the 2024 Robin Hood report found.
A
Con Edison spokesperson said: “Termination of service is a last resort,
and we do so only after extensive outreach and exhausting all other
options … nearly two-thirds of residential customers in arrears are on
payment plans. It is essential that our customers pay their bills to
maintain safe service and the most reliable system in the nation.”
Most customers were reconnected within 24 hours and 80% within a week, the spokesperson added.
A
woman uses a fan to cool off on a day where the heat index is expected
to top 100 degrees Fahrenheit in New York on 25 July 2025. Photograph: Spencer Platt/Getty Images
Nationwide, an estimated one in three households
experience energy poverty – the inability to access sufficient amounts
of electricity and other energy sources due to financial hardship.
Low-income households, people of color and states with the fewest social
safety nets are disproportionately affected, and millions of families
are regularly forced to ration food, medicines, energy and other
essentials
Across New York state – and the
country – a patchwork of regulations prevent some households from being
shut off on very hot or cold days, but millions are not protected at
all.
New York, like much of the US, is
susceptible to extreme highs and low temperatures, and the climate
crisis is driving more frequent and more intense heatwaves.
The
number of heat deaths has been rising over the past decade, and on
average 525 people in New York City die prematurely each year for
heat-related reasons – the vast majority due to the impact high
temperatures and humidity have on existing medical conditions, according
to the latest figures from the city’s department of public health.
Heat
kills twice Black New Yorkers at twice the rate of white residents due
to past and current structural racism that creates economic, healthcare,
housing, energy and other systems that benefit white people and
disadvantage people of color, the report found.
Most deaths occur in homes without access to a functioning air conditioning. Citywide, 11% of
New Yorkers do not have air conditioners at home but the rate is much
higher in low-income communities of color. One study found that a fifth
of renters do not use their air conditioner due to cost.
And
while protections have improved in recent years, it has not been enough
to shield families hit hardest by rising energy prices, rents and
inflation – or the increasingly brutal heat and humidity.
According
to its website, Con Edison currently suspends disconnections on the
hottest and coldest days based on forecasts from the National Weather
Service. In the summer, the utility will not disconnect a family the day
of or day before the heat index – what the temperature feels like when
humidity is taken into account – is forecast to hit 90F (32.2C) at
Central Park – one of the shadiest parts of the city. It also suspends
disconnections for two days after a 90F heat index day.
Yet
temperatures in some neighborhoods in the Bronx and upper Manhattan,
where there are fewer trees, less access to air conditioning, more Black
and Latino residents, and most heat deaths, exceed Central Park by 6 to
8 degrees due to the heat island effect, according to one study from 2022.
Energy poverty is a chronic problem for many New Yorkers.
A ConEdison van in the Bronx borough of New York on 20 July 2019. Photograph: David Dee Delgado/Bloomberg via Getty Images
New York state is the largest recipient of
Liheap, the chronically underfunded bipartisan federal program that
helped about 6m households keep on top of energy bills last year – and
which narrowly survived being cut completely from Trump’s 2026 budget.
In
fiscal year 2024-25, New York received $379m (almost 10%) of the total
Liheap fund, and Governor Kathy Hochul invested an additional $35m to
supplement support for heating bills in January after Liheap money ran
out with months of winter still to go.
In
the summer, the Liheap program only covers the cost of an air
conditioning unit and installation for qualifying low-income households
in New York – not energy bills. A city program can provide a
means-tested loan for working families in arrears.
Disconnections
declined during the pandemic thanks to a statewide moratorium and debt
forgiveness schemes, as well as child tax credits and a boost to food
stamps among other federal programs that helped lift millions of
Americans out of poverty. But the Covid-era social safety programs have
now all been terminated, and recent focus groups conducted by Hernandez
and her colleagues found people still struggling to recover and
rationing energy use because they were so concerned about rising bills.
“The
city has got better at advocating for households disproportionately
impacted by disconnections but it’s a drop in the bucket of where it
should be,” said Hernandez, the energy justice expert. “The 88,000
households disconnected are people who have done everything to get the
money and still couldn’t get caught up. It illustrates families have
been left completely exposed.”
Yet energy costs are about to get even higher in New York.
People cool off at a fire hydrant in New York on 25 June 2025. Photograph: Charly Triballeau/AFP/Getty Images
Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act will make
electricity production more expensive, leading to residents paying $140 a
year on average more by 2030, according to analysis by Energy Innovation.
The bill also slashes benefits such as Snap (food stamps) and Medicaid,
which will put further pressure on millions of families.
Meanwhile,
Con Edison is under fire from city and state politicians including
Hochul and the city comptroller (chief finance officer) and former
mayoral candidate, Brad Lander, for requesting a rate hike of 11% for
electricity and 13% for gas, which the regulator is currently
considering. Con Ed’s proposed electricity rate hike could raise the
average household bill by $372 next year. (The utility provides gas to
1.1m homes.)
“The combination of rising
temperatures, rising electricity rates, the possible termination of the
federal Liheap program, and this increase in shutoffs by Con Ed risks
dramatically increasing heat-related illness and deaths for New
Yorkers,” Lander told the Guardian.
“There
needs to be strategies in place so that people will pay their bills –
but to punish people who are poor by cutting off their electricity ever,
but especially in extreme heat or wintertime, is inhumane. It is a form
of debtors’ prison.”
Con Edison said it
provided $311m in bill discounts to income-eligible customers last year,
and the regulator (PSC) recently expanded the Energy Affordability
Program to help more vulnerable residents.
The eastern half of the US is facing a significant heatwave, with more than 185 million people under warnings due to intense and widespread heat conditions on Monday.
The
south-east is likely to endure the most dangerous temperatures as the
extreme heat spread across the region on Monday, spanning from the
Carolinas through Florida.
In these areas, heat index values (how hot it feels once humidity is
accounted for) are forecast to range between 105 and 113F (40.5 to 45C).
Some locations in Mississippi and Louisiana face an even greater threat, with the heat index possibly soaring as high as 120F (49C).
Meanwhile,
the midwest isn’t escaping the heat. Conditions there remain hazardous
into Monday and Tuesday, after a weekend in which temperatures felt as
if they were between 97 and 111F (36 to 44C) in areas from Lincoln, Nebraska, north to Minneapolis.
Cities such as Des Moines, St Louis, Memphis, New
Orleans, Jacksonville and Raleigh are under extreme heat warnings. In
these locations, temperatures will climb into the mid-90s and low 100s,
with heat indices potentially reaching 110 to 115F.
The
most dangerous conditions, classified as level 4 out of 4 on the heat
risk scale, encompass much of Florida and extend north into Georgia
and the Carolinas. A broader level 3 zone stretches from the eastern
plains through the midwest and into the mid-Atlantic. This follows a
weekend already dominated by extreme temperatures.
Tampa experienced an unprecedented milestone on
Sunday when it reached 100F (37.8C). Other cities also broke daily
temperature records, and more are expected to follow suit.
The
dangerous heat and humidity are expected to persist through midweek,
affecting major metropolitan areas including St Louis, Memphis,
Charlotte, Savannah, Tampa and Jackson, Mississippi.
Actual air temperatures will climb into the upper 90s and low 100s,
while heat index readings are expected to remain between 105 and 115F
for several days due to high tropical moisture.
Relief
will be hard to find, even during the night. Overnight and early
morning temperatures are forecast to dip only into the 70s or above,
keeping conditions uncomfortable around the clock.
However, a cold front moving in later this week is expected to bring a drop in temperatures across the eastern US, offering a much-needed break from the extreme heat by the weekend.
Elsewhere,
triple-digit temperatures will dominate the central US. The combination
of soaring heat and dense humidity in the Mississippi River valley and
central plains could make conditions especially hazardous, with some
areas possibly seeing the heat index reach 120F.
Data suggests that there are more than 1,300 deaths per year in the US due to extreme heat, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
While no one single weather event can be blamed on the global climate
crisis, the warming world is experiencing a greater frequency of extreme
weather incidents.
According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
(Noaa), excessive heat is already the leading cause of weather-related
deaths in the US, and the problem is only intensifying. For vulnerable
populations, such as migrants, prisoners or schoolchildren in
under-cooled buildings, the burden of rising temperatures is compounded.
Despite the increasingly crucial need to find solutions
for the rising temperatures, many US agencies are currently
understaffed due to cuts from the Trump administration and the so-called
“department of government efficiency” (Doge).
Federal
science agencies such as Noaa are now operating at reduced capacity
despite the outsized weather threats. Hundreds of meteorologists have left the National Weather Service in recent months, and several offices, including Houston, have had to scale back the services they provide.
Record-breaking extreme weather is the new norm
in the UK, scientists have said, showing that the country is firmly in
the grip of the climate crisis.
The hottest
days people endure have dramatically increased in frequency and
severity, and periods of intense rain have also ramped up, data from
hundreds of weather stations shows. Heatwaves and floods leading to
deaths and costly damage are of “profound concern” for health,
infrastructure and the functioning of society, the scientists said.
The
weather records clearly show the UK’s climate is different now compared
with just a few decades ago, the scientists said, as a result of the
carbon pollution emitted by burning fossil fuels.
The
analysis found that the number of days with temperatures 5C above the
average for 1961-1990 had doubled in the last 10 years. For days 8C
above average, the number has trebled and for 10C above average it has
quadrupled. The UK has also become 8% sunnier in the last decade.
The assessment also reported that rain had become
more intense. The number of months where counties receive at least
double the average rainfall has risen by 50% in the last 20 years. Much
of the additional rain is falling in the months from October to March.
That period in 2023-24 was the wettest ever, in records that span back
to 1767, and resulted in flooding in Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, the
West Midlands and elsewhere.
The
sea level around the UK is rising faster than the global average, the
report said, which worsens the impact of coastal flooding.
Six hundred people are believed to have died due to the heatwave that hit England and Wales at the end of June. The soaring temperatures were made 100 times more likely by global heating, the scientists calculated. Two more heatwaves have followed in quick succession.
The government’s preparations to protect people from the escalating impacts of the climate crisis were condemned as “inadequate, piecemeal and disjointed” by official advisers in April.
Mike
Kendon at the Met Office, who led the analysis, said: “Breaking records
frequently and seeing these extremes, this is now the norm. We might
not notice the change from one year to the next, but if we look back 10
years, or 30 years, we can see some really big changes. We’re moving
outside the envelope of what we’ve known in the past.”
“The
extremes have the greatest impact for our society, if we think about
our infrastructure, our public health, and how we function,” he said.
“So this is really of profound concern.”
The assessment, called the State of the UK Climate 2024 and published in the International Journal of Climatology,
found the last three years were in the UK’s top five hottest years on
record. The warmest spring on record was seen in 2024 although this has
already been surpassed in 2025.
The UK has particularly long meteorological records and the Central England Temperature series
is the longest instrumental record in the world. It shows that recent
temperatures have far exceeded any in at least 300 years. However,
today’s high temperatures are likely to be average by 2050, and cool by
2100, the scientists said.
Sea level around
the UK has already risen by 19cm over the last century, as glaciers and
ice sheets melt and the oceans absorb heat and expand. The rise is
accelerating and is higher around the UK than globally, although
scientists are yet to work out why. It could rise by up to 200cm by the
end of the century, said Dr Svetlana Jevrejeva, at the National
Oceanography Centre.
Storm winds can push
seawater surges on to coasts and are most dangerous when they coincide
with the highest tides. “The extra sea level rise [due to global
heating] is leading to an increase in the frequency of extreme sea
levels and an intensification of coastal hazards,” said Jevrejeva. “It
is only a matter of time until the UK is next in the path of a major
storm surge event.”
While heat records are
increasingly being broken, cold weather events are becoming less common.
For example, days with air frosts have fallen by 14 per year in the
last decade, compared with the 1931-1990 average.
The
UK’s changed climate has also affected nature, the report said. The
earliest ever frogspawn and blackbird nesting was seen in 2024, in
records that began in 1999. All but one of the 13 natural events
monitored were earlier than average in 2024, from the first lesser
celandine flower to the first elder leaves. The changes mean species
that depend on others, such as for food or pollination, risk getting out
of sync, said Dr Judith Garforth at the Woodland Trust.
Prof
Liz Bentley, at the Royal Meteorological Society, said the report
showed the urgent need to make the UK resilient to climate-fuelled
extreme weather: “This report is not just a record of change, but a call
to action.”
The
thermometer of a drugstore shows the temperature of 39 degrees Celsius
(102 degrees Fahrenheit) during a heat wave, in Rome, Tuesday, July 1,
2025.
Extreme heat is a killer and its impact is becoming far, far
deadlier as the human-caused climate crisis supercharges temperatures,
according to a new study, which estimates global warming tripled the
number of deaths in the recent European heat wave.
For more than a week, temperatures in many parts of Europe
spiked above 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Tourist attractions closed, wildfires ripped through several countries, and people struggled to cope on a continent where air conditioning is rare.
The outcome was deadly. Thousands of people are estimated to
have lost their lives, according to a first-of-its-kind rapid analysis
study published Wednesday.
A team of researchers, led by Imperial College London and
the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, looked at 10 days of
extreme heat between June 23 and July 2 across 12 European cities,
including London, Paris, Athens, Madrid and Rome.
They used historical weather data to calculate how intense
the heat would have been if humans had not burned fossil fuels and
warmed the world by 1.3 degrees Celsius. They found climate change made
Europe’s heat wave 1 to 4 degrees Celsius (1.8 to 7.2 Fahrenheit)
hotter.
The scientists then used research on the relationship
between heat and daily deaths to estimate how many people lost their
lives.
They found approximately 2,300 people died during ten days
of heat across the 12 cities, around 1,500 more than would have died in a
world without climate change. In other words, global heating was
responsible for 65% of the total death toll.
“The results show how relatively small increases in the
hottest temperatures can trigger huge surges in death,” the study
authors wrote.
Heat has a particularly pernicious impact on people with
underlying health conditions, such as heart disease, diabetes and
respiratory problems.
People over 65 years old were most affected, accounting for
88% of the excess deaths, according to the analysis. But heat can be
deadly for anyone. Nearly 200 of the estimated deaths across the 12
cities were among those aged 20 to 65.
Climate change was responsible for the vast majority of heat deaths in
some cities. In Madrid, it accounted for about 90% of estimated heat
wave deaths, the analysis found.
The study’s focus on 12 cities makes it just a snapshot of
the true heat wave death toll across the continent, which researchers
estimate could be up to tens of thousands of people.
“Heatwaves don’t leave a trail of destruction like wildfires
or storms,” said Ben Clarke, a study author and a researcher at
Imperial College London. “Their impacts are mostly invisible but quietly
devastating — a change of just 2 or 3 degrees Celsius can mean the
difference between life and death for thousands of people.
The world must stop burning fossil fuels to stop heat waves
becoming hotter and deadlier and cities need to urgently adapt, said
Friederike Otto, a climate scientist at Imperial College London.
“Shifting to renewable energy, building cities that can withstand
extreme heat, and protecting the poorest and most vulnerable is
absolutely essential,” she said.
Akshay Deoras, a research scientist at the University of
Reading who was not involved in the analysis, said “robust techniques
used in this study leave no doubt that climate change is already a
deadly force in Europe.”
Richard Allan, a professor of climate science at the
University of Reading who was also not involved in the report, said the
study added to huge amounts of evidence that climate change is making
heat waves more intense, “meaning that moderate heat becomes dangerous
and record heat becomes unprecedented.”
A man takes a break in the heat as he works at a road construction site in Milan. Photograph: Luca Bruno/AP
Outdoor working has been banned during the
hottest parts of the day in more than half of Italy’s regions as an
extreme heatwave that has smashed June temperature records in Spain and Portugal continues to grip large swathes of Europe.
The
savage temperatures are believed to have claimed at least three lives,
including that of a small boy who is thought to have died from
heatstroke while in a car in Catalonia’s Tarragona province on Tuesday
afternoon.
In
Palermo, Sicily, a 53-year-old woman died on Monday after fainting
while walking along a street. She had reportedly suffered from a heart
condition.
A 70-year-old man was reported to
have drowned at a tourist resort close to Turin as intense heat gave way
to storms and flash floods.
Admissions to hospital emergency units in parts of Italy have risen by 15-20% in recent days. The majority of patients are elderly people suffering from dehydration.
The heatwave, which has forced the evacuation of tens of thousands of people from their homes in Turkey due to wildfires,
has also forced the closure of schools in parts of France – as
education unions warned the classrooms were dangerously hot for children
and teachers.
The top of the Eiffel Tower was closed to tourists amid the high temperatures in Paris. Photograph: Tom Nicholson/Reuters
Tourists, meanwhile, were confronted with closures of some of Europe’s
popular attractions. The top of the Eiffel Tower was shut as
temperatures in Paris were poised to hit 38C (100.4F). In Brussels, the
Atomium monument, famed for its giant stainless steel balls, closed
early as temperatures inched towards 37C.
Paris is on red alert
for high temperatures, with the top of the Eiffel Tower shut, polluting
traffic banned and speed restrictions in place as a searing heatwave
grips Europe. Photograph: Thibaud Moritz/AFP/Getty Images
In Italy, Lombardy and Emilia-Romagna, two
industrial hubs, announced they were stopping open-air work between
12.30pm and 4pm, joining 11 other regions – stretching from Liguria in
the north-west to Calabria and Sicily in the south – that have imposed
similar bans in recent days.
Local authorities
were heeding advice from trade unions after the death of Brahim Ait El
Hajjam, a 47-year-old construction worker, who collapsed and died while
working on a building site close to Bologna, the capital of
Emilia-Romagna, on Monday.
Two workers fell ill on Tuesday on a construction site near Vicenza in Veneto. One is reportedly in a coma.
The
CGIL Bologna and Fillea CGIL unions said in a statement: “While we wait
to learn the actual cause of death, it is essential, during this
terrible period, to promote a culture of safety.
“The
climate emergency has clearly worsened the conditions for those who
work outside every day and companies must give absolute priority to the
protection of workers.”
The French national rail operator SNCF said train travel between France and Italy had been suspended for “at least several days” after violent storms on Monday, AFP reported.Cogne, a town in Italy’s Aosta Valley that suffered severe flooding in June last year, has been cut off by a landslide.
The Spanish state meteorological agency, Aemet, said in a social media update that
“June 2025 smashed records” when it came to high temperature, with an
average temperature of 23.6C, 0.8C above the previous hottest June in
2017.
The monthly average was also 3.5C higher than the average over the period from 1991 to 2020, it said.
A man drinks from a fountain during hot weather in Naples. Photograph: Ansa/Ciro Fusco/EPA
The agency’s comments come just days after
Spain’s highest ever June temperature of 46C was recorded in the Huelva
province of Andalucía.
In Portugal,
temperatures hit 46.6C in Mora, a town in the Évora district, in recent
days, making it the highest June temperature ever recorded in the
country, according to the Portuguese Institute for the Sea and
Atmosphere.
In France, the prime minister,
François Bayrou, tried to calm anger at the heatwave crisis in French
schools. More than 1,896 schools across the country were fully or
partially closed on Tuesday.
In Paris,
which was on maximum heatwave alert, parents were advised to keep their
children at home on Tuesday and Wednesday. Some other towns, including
Troyes and Melun, closed all their schools.
Bayrou
said the education ministry would open talks with mayors on how to
adapt school buildings, most of which are extremely poorly insulated.
As
temperatures rose on Tuesday, some Paris teachers had nothing more than
a water spray on their desk to repeatedly spritz children in classrooms
in the hope of keeping cool.
Several
Spanish regions, including Barcelona, were on alert for exceptionally
high temperatures as the first heatwave of the summer hit the country. Photograph: Alejandro García/EPA
Bayrou, who is facing a vote of no confidence on
Tuesday, which he is expected to survive, has cancelled his meetings to
monitor the situation in real time.
The hot weather front known in Germany
as Bettina is expected to have nearly the entire country in its grip by
Wednesday, with temperatures shooting toward the 40C mark and only the
coasts and Alpine peaks spared the scorching temperatures.
Industry
groups warned that schools, elderly care homes and hospitals were
ill-prepared for the heatwave – an urgent issue they said must be
addressed as the frequency of life-threatening weather increases.
Turkey’s
forestry minister, İbrahim Yumaklı, said firefighters had been called
out to 263 wildfires across the country in recent days. Firefighters
have also been tackling wildfires in parts of France and Italy,
especially on the islands of Sardinia and Sicily.
More than 150 people fell ill with heat at an outdoor high school graduation ceremony in New Jersey
on Monday – and the fire chief of the city of Paterson declared “a mass
casualty incident” due to the overwhelming number of those who needed
emergency treatment.
The incident happened as
students from several local schools in the city gathered at Hinchliffe
Stadium to hear their names read out as graduates. Paterson’s fire
department said about 50 people were evaluated, and nine were sent to a
local hospital from the stadium.
During
a second ceremony at the stadium, about 100 people ended up needing
treatment – and seven were hospitalized. The Paterson mayor, André
Sayegh, declared a state of emergency due to the high heat and canceled all recreational activities “until further notice”.
Temperatures in the region have soared in recent
days, registering in the upper 90s fahrenheit. But the humidity pushes
heat indexes to 107F (42C). In all, 150 million people have been under
heat alerts from Maine to eastern Texas.
The
brutal temperatures stem from a so-called heat dome, which is when high
pressure from Earth’s atmosphere compresses warm air and pushes it down
to the surface. They have been increasingly common in the US in recent
years because of rising global temperatures being spurred by Earth’s
ongoing climate emergency.
Temperatures in New
York City on Tuesday inspired the attorney general, Letitia James, to
predict that the heat could benefit the progressive candidate Zohran
Mamdani, who is running in the Big Apple’s closely watched Democratic
mayoral primary.
“Mother Nature will have the
last word,” James said. Taking an overt dig at Mamdani’s rival Andrew
Cuomo, who resigned as New York governor amid accusations of sexually
harassing women, James added: “She represents women scorned.
“How ironic.”
In
the north-eastern US, several heat records look set to fall as
temperatures in some locations are predicted to reach 110F. “Significant
and dangerous heat continues today, with potentially some of the
hottest temperatures in over a decade in some locations,” the weather
service Accuweather said on Tuesday.
The national Storm Prediction Center
says all areas of New Jersey have a “marginal” risk of seeing severe
thunderstorms with small hail and damaging winds on Wednesday. That
could bring a reprieve from the temperatures while giving residents
other weather perils to worry about.
Man uses a portable
fan as he tries to stay cool in Busch Stadium before a baseball game
between the St Louis Cardinals and the Cincinnati Reds on Saturday. Photograph: Jeff Roberson/AP
Associated Press
Tens of millions of people across the midwest and
east braced on Sunday for another sweltering day of dangerously hot
temperatures as a rare June heatwave continued to grip parts of the US.
Most
of the north-eastern quadrant of the country from Minnesota to Maine
was under some type of heat advisory on Sunday. So were parts of
Arkansas, Tennessee, Louisiana and Mississippi.
The
temperature had already reached 80F (26.6C) in the Chicago area by
7.30am on Sunday, according to the National Weather Service. Forecasts
called for heat indices of between 100 and 105F.
The
heat index in Pittsburgh was expected to top 105F. The temperature in
Columbus, Ohio, was 77F at 8.30am. Highs there were expected to reach
97F with a heat index around 104F.
Forecasts called for a heat index of 100F in Philadelphia on Sunday, with a 108F heat index on Monday.
The
city’s public health department declared a heat emergency starting at
noon on Sunday and ending on Wednesday evening. Officials directed
residents to air-conditioned libraries, community centers and other
locations, and set up a “heat line” staffed by medical professionals to
discuss conditions and illnesses made worse by the heat. At Lincoln
Financial Field, officials said each fan attending Sunday’s Fifa World Cup match would be allowed to bring in one 20oz plastic bottle of water.
Forecasters
warned the heat index in Cromwell, Connecticut, would reach 105F on
Sunday, which could make life brutal for golfers Tommy Fleetwood and
Keegan Bradley as they compete during the final round of the Travelers
Championship.
Elly De La Cruz, a Cincinnati
Reds shortstop playing against the Cardinals in St Louis, and Trent
Thornton, a Seattle Mariners reliever facing the Cubs in Chicago, got
sick on Saturday while playing in the extreme heat.
Sunday marked the second straight day of extreme
heat across the midwest and east coast. Heat indices on Saturday hit
103F in Chicago and 101F in Madison, Wisconsin, turning that city’s
annual naked bike ride into a sticky and sweaty affair.
Lynn
Watkins, 53, is the director of Sacred Hearts daycare in Sun Prairie, a
Madison suburb. She said that she tried to sit outside on Saturday to
grill but it was so hot she had to go inside. She plans to cancel all
outdoor activities at the daycare on Monday with highs around 93F
forecast.
“I can’t stand being outside when it’s like this,” she said. “I just want to sit in my air conditioning.”
Minneapolis
baked under a heat index of 106F. The actual temperature was 96F, which
broke the previous record for the date of 95F set in 1910, according to
the weather service.
The heat is expected to persist into the coming
week, with the hottest temperatures shifting eastward. New York City is
expected to see highs around 95F on Monday and Tuesday. Boston is on
track for highs approaching 100F on Tuesday, and temperatures in
Washington DC were expected to hit 100F on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Meteorologists say a phenomenon known as a heat dome,
a large area of high pressure in the upper atmosphere that traps heat
and humidity, is responsible for the extreme temperatures.
Mark
Gehring, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Sullivan,
Wisconsin, said this level of heat is not uncommon during the summer
months in the US, although it usually takes hold in mid-July or early
August. The most unusual facet of this heatwave is the sheer amount of
territory sweltering under it, he said.
“It’s
basically everywhere east of the Rockies,” he said, referring to the
Rocky Mountains. “That is unusual, to have this massive area of high
dewpoints and heat.”
Researchers
say the 32C expected this weekend in the south-east would have been
expected only once every 2,500 years without the climate crisis. Photograph: Martin Godwin/The Guardian
The dangerous 32C heat
that will be endured by people in the south-east of England on Saturday
will have been made 100 times more likely by the climate crisis,
scientists have calculated.
Global heating,
caused by the burning of fossil fuels, is making every heatwave more
likely and more intense. The 32C (89.6F) day forecast on Saturday would
have been expected only once every 2,500 years without the climate
crisis, the researchers said, and June heatwaves are now about 2-4C
(3.6-7.2F) hotter than in the past.
The heat is expected to cause premature deaths,
particularly among older and vulnerable people. More than 10,000 people
died before their time in summer heatwaves between 2020 and 2024,
according to the UK Health Security Agency, and the UK government has
been heavily criticised for failing to properly prepare people for
extreme weather.
Prolonged heat is especially
dangerous as it gives no time for people’s bodies to cool off. Maximum
temperatures in the south-east are expected to be above 28C for three
consecutive days. The scientists said this heatwave was made 10 times
more likely by the climate crisis.
Dr Ben Clarke at Imperial College London, who was
part of the research team, said the culprit for the extreme heat was
clear. “This weather just wouldn’t have been a heatwave without
human-induced warming,” he said.
Clarke
said: “With every fraction of a degree of warming, the UK will
experience hotter, more dangerous heatwaves. That means more heat
deaths, more pressure on the NHS, more transport disruptions, and
tougher work conditions. The best way to avoid a future of relentless
heat is by shifting to renewable energy.”
Dr
Friederike Otto, also at Imperial College London, said: “It is really
important to highlight this early summer heatwave because the impacts of
heat are still severely underestimated, and the UK is not prepared for
this type of weather.” The Climate Change Committee, the government’s
official advisers, said in April that the UK’s preparations for adapting
to a changing climate were “inadequate, piecemeal and disjointed”.
Otto
said: “Heatwaves are called the silent killer, because we don’t see
people dropping dead on the street, but killers they are. In Europe in
2022, more than 60,000 people died in the summer from extreme heat.”
Maja
Vahlberg at the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre said: “Sadly most
people die from heat indoors and alone, especially older people and
those with underlying health conditions, such as lung or heart disease.”
Prof
Mike Tipton, a physiologist at Portsmouth University, said: “The human
body is not designed to tolerate prolonged exposure to this sort of
extreme heat. It is undeniable that climate change is now costing
British lives. Those politicians and commentators who pour scorn on
climate action should reflect on this fact because, until we stop
emitting greenhouse gases, these episodes are only likely to become more
extreme.”
The extremely dry spring, combined with soaring temperatures, means the UK is also facing a high risk of wildfires,
said Theodore Keeping, also at Imperial College London: “We’ve already
seen the highest burnt area on record in the UK this year.” People
should take extreme care with fires, barbecues and cigarettes, he said.
The rapid study
of the role of global heating in the predicted weekend heatwave
compared the likelihood of the high temperatures in today’s hotter
climate with that in the cooler preindustrial period. The team, part of
the World Weather Attribution group, was also able to reuse detailed climate modelling undertaken for a similar heatwave in 2022, speeding up their conclusions.
They
said older people were at greatest risk from the high temperatures, but
that others with existing vulnerabilities could also be affected, with
the effectiveness of some medications being changed by the heat or
affecting people’s ability to cool down.
Sweating
is how the body cools so it is vital to drink plenty of water, the
researchers said. Closing windows and curtains during the day and
opening them in the cool of the night can help keep temperatures in
homes down, they said. A recent study estimated that 80% of UK homes overheat in the summer.
Extreme heat is more deadly than floods, earthquakes and hurricanes combined, according to a report by the insurance giant Swiss Re published on 12 June. “Up to half a million people globally succumb to the effects of extreme heat each year,” it said.
“Extreme
heat used to be considered the ‘invisible peril’ because the impacts
are not as obvious as of other natural perils,” said Jérôme Haegeli,
chief economist at Swiss Re. “With a clear trend to longer, hotter
heatwaves, it is important we shine a light on the true cost to human
life, our economy, infrastructure, agriculture and healthcare.”
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