MILAN (AP) – Authorities on Tuesday warned residents and tourists flocking to Mediterranean destinations as a second heatwave hits the region in weeks, sparking wildfires in Greece, Spain and Switzerland. However, they warned people to stay indoors during the hottest hours.
In Italy, civil protection workers monitored crowds of people suffering from the heat in central Rome, while Portuguese Red Cross teams used social media to warn people not to leave pets and children in parked cars. warned people. Volunteers handed out drinking water in Greece and warned people in Spain not to breathe smoke from the fires.
“Heatwaves are truly invisible killers,” Panu Sarlist, emergency medical team leader for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, told a news conference in Geneva. “Here in Europe, every summer we experience long periods of increasingly hotter temperatures.”
A new heatwave is expected to last for several days in some parts of southern Europe. The United Nations meteorological agency said climate change could cause temperatures to rise in Europe and break the record of 48.8 degrees Celsius (119.8 degrees Fahrenheit) set in Sicily two years ago.
Civil protection volunteers handed out reusable water bottles at 28 popular spots in Rome amid growing concerns that extreme heat could cause a spike in deaths. Authorities are also encouraging visitors and residents to take advantage of the Italian capital’s characteristic public drinking fountains, of which there are hundreds in the city’s historic center alone.
Fausto Alberetto, who was visiting Rome from the northern Italian region of Piedmont on Tuesday, asked several volunteers how to use the app to find the nearest Nasone. What he had read about heatwaves before the trip did little to prepare him for the reality of Rome’s 40-degree (104-degree) temperatures, he said.
“We’ve been informed and prepared. But it’s one thing to hear or read it, it’s another thing to feel it,” said Alberto, near Piazza Venezia in central Rome. he said while walking. “You know, it’s really bad.”
Giuseppe Napolitano, head of Rome’s civil protection department, said civil protection volunteers had identified four people who appeared to be suffering from the heat, but none were in serious condition.
In Cyprus, a 90-year-old man died and six other elderly people were hospitalized over the weekend after all seven people suffered heatstroke at his home when temperatures exceeded 43 degrees Celsius (110 degrees Fahrenheit) last week. Health authorities confirmed.
Heat records are being shattered around the world, and scientists say 2023 is likely to be the hottest year on record, with measurements dating back to the mid-19th century.
Preliminary figures suggest global average temperatures last month set a new June record, according to the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Agency. The World Meteorological Organization has predicted a number of record-breaking heatwaves this summer. The United Nations meteorological agency said unprecedented sea surface temperatures and low sea ice levels in the Arctic were the main causes.
Human-induced climate change due to the burning of coal, oil, and natural gas is making the world hotter, which is further amplified by the naturally occurring El Niño phenomenon. However, the current El Niño phenomenon only started a few months ago, is still weak to moderate, and is expected to reach its peak in the winter.
Temperatures above 40°C (104°F) are predicted to persist across North America, Asia and North Africa, as well as the Mediterranean Sea.
“These are not normal weather systems of the past. They are the result of climate change,” said John Nairn, senior heat advisor at the World Meteorological Organization. “It’s global warming and it’s going to continue for a while.”
Mr Nairn pointed out that since the 1980s, the number of simultaneous heat waves has increased sixfold and that “the trend line has not changed”.
Last year’s unrelenting summer left Europe sweating with heat wave after heat wave, resulting in 61,000 heat-related deaths, scientists estimate. In 2019, the world experienced the hottest July on record, with continents also experiencing extreme heat and even towns in the Arctic reaching new heatwaves.
In 2018, temperature records were broken in Spain and Portugal as a mass of hot air rose from Africa and sparked forest fires across the Iberian Peninsula.
The idea that hot weather is not just an inconvenience but can be deadly was impressed upon many parts of Europe by the deadly heat wave of 2003.
In France, the worst-hit country, there were about 15,000 heat-related deaths, many of them elderly people stranded in urban apartments or nursing homes without air conditioning. The fatal incident prompted the country to introduce a warning system and reconsider how it deals with extreme temperatures.
Other countries are also taking steps to protect their citizens’ aid through the sweltering summer of 2023.
Last week in Greece, authorities introduced changes to working hours and ordered afternoon closures of the Acropolis and other ancient sites to help workers cope with high fevers. A second heatwave is expected to hit on Thursday, with temperatures in parts of south-central Greece expected to reach a maximum of 44 degrees Celsius (111 degrees Celsius) by the weekend.
Three large wildfires have been burning on the outskirts of Athens for two days. Thousands of people who had been evacuated from coastal areas south of the capital returned to their homes on Tuesday after spending the night on beaches, hotels and public buildings as the fire finally subsided.
Much of Spain is on alert for high to extreme heat, with forecasts for areas along the Ebro River in the northeast and the island of Mallorca to hit a high of 43 degrees Celsius (109 degrees Celsius). Spain is also grappling with a prolonged drought, raising concerns about the risk of wildfires.
Approximately 400 firefighters, supported by nine water cannons, battled a wildfire that continued to burn for four consecutive days on La Palma Island in Spain’s Canary Islands. Officials said a perimeter had been set up around the fire, but activity continued.
Around 150 firefighters, police, army and other emergency teams, supported by helicopters, were called to action in Switzerland on Tuesday to fight a wildfire that has engulfed a mountainside in the southwestern Wallis region, killing four villages and settlements in the region. residents were evacuated.
The World Meteorological Organization said in a report on Monday that a panel of experts verified the accuracy of Europe’s all-time record temperature: 48.8 degrees Celsius (119.8°F) recorded in Sicily on August 11, 2021. announced. The full report has not yet been published.
The previous verified record of 48 degrees Celsius (118.4 degrees Fahrenheit) was set in Athens on July 10, 1977.
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Mr. Keaton reported from Geneva. Associated Press writers Dana Bertasi in London; Derek Gatopoulos of Athens; Joseph Wilson of Barcelona. Menelaos Hadjikostis of Nicosia, Cyprus. Trisha Thomas and Frances D’Emilio in Rome contributed.
