Sicily sizzles at 48.8°C; heat roils Europe, Africa
ROME/ATHENS: Stifling heat kept its grip on much of southern Europe on Thursday, driving people indoors at midday, spoiling crops, triggering drinking water restrictions, turning public libraries into cooling “climate shelters” and complicating the already difficult challenge firefighters are facing as they battle wildfires.
In many places, forecasters said worse was expected to come. In Italy, the island of Sicily may have just smashed continental Europe’s heat record. The temperature there reached 48.8°C on Wednesday, Sicily’s weather service said. That - if officially verified would top the record of 48°C set in Athens in 1977, according to World Meteorological Organization data posted by Us-based Arizona State University.
In Italy, 15 cities received warnings from the health ministry about high temperatures with a peak predicted for Friday. The cities included Rome, Florence and Palermo, but also Bolzano, which is traditionally a refreshing hot-weather escape in the Alps.
In Serbia, the spell of hot, dry weather prompted four municipalities to declare an emergency after the Rzav river levels plummeted, endangering water supplies. Authorities imposed drinking water restrictions affecting some 250,000 people, while the army brought in water tanks for public use.
In Spain, the national weather service warned temperatures could hit 44°C in some areas in the coming days. Parts of the northeastern Catalonia region were forecast to reach 42°C on Thursday.
Firefighters battled on Thursday
to contain flare-ups in Greece, where forest fires have caused what PM Kyriakos Mitsotakis described as the country’s “greatest ecological disaster in decades”. Greece’s most severe heatwave has fanned infernos that have destroyed more than 100,000 hectares of forests and farmland.
While much attention has focused on southern Europe’s heat crisis, it was even hotter on the North African shore of the Mediterranean Sea. Temperatures hit 50°C in Tunisia, a record high for the country.
In Algeria, most of the regions of the north have been placed on alert for heatwaves. Fires ravaging mountain forests and villages in Algeria’s Berber region have killed at least 65 people, including 28 soldiers.
The scorching trail of heatwaves and fires in Europe and Africa came after western US, especially California, and western Canada experienced similar unprecedented weather woes earlier this summer.