In London, the 40-degree mark was crossed for the first time since these records on Tuesday.
That much of the Iberian Peninsula is suffocating with the thermometer above 40 or even 47 degrees may seem typical of any summer. Even the images of today’s forest fires in Zamora or Portugal are not that abnormal, nor are the tragic loss of life that can accompany them.
On the other hand, this scenario is moving to European regions commonly described as ‘cool’, rainy or even a haven for those escaping the heat for their summer holidays. Be it Galicia, in the Spanish case, or Brittany, in the French case, as well as London, West Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands.
The French ‘canicule’ has put up to 64 municipalities on alert, mainly on the Atlantic coast as a whole, in each of which historical maxima have been recorded, France’s meteorological services warned on Tuesday. Among them, in the city of Nantes, with 40.3 degrees. The second alert level applies in 73 of the 101 French departments; in 15 of the Atlantic coast it is already at the highest level.
The 40-degree mark was crossed in London on Tuesday, for the first time since these data are available. “The fire service is under enormous pressure,” the mayor of the British capital, Sadiq Khan, warned via his Twitter account after registering 40.2 degrees.
There have been multiple fires in the capital, houses threatened and a mobilization of hundreds of firefighters ready to act in light of what has been declared a “serious incident”.
The situation is an emergency, in a country and a city unaccustomed to these climatic conditions. While in the countries of Southern Europe, rail traffic has been cut off from time to time only in those sections exposed to forest fires, in the UK it has been interrupted in part of the country.
Trains have not run all along England’s east coast as British authorities are asking people to change their travel plans.
It is not a measure to be taken “lightly”, rail network sources explained to the BBC. The company’s engineers must assess the withstand capacity of its railway infrastructure under these temperatures. Not only the plans of travelers by train were affected, also flights to or from London Luton airport were suspended or diverted due to damage to the runway.
From Germany, the Deutsche Bahn – the railway company – has been offering travelers the opportunity to exchange their ticket since Tuesday at no extra cost, given forecasts that also point to record highs in the large Central European country. Peak temperatures were expected Tuesday through at least Thursday, starting in the west and then moving east.
One of the regions most affected by the arrival of the ‘Hitzewelle’ heat wave, in German- is North Rhine-Westphalia. That is, the densely populated “country” of the west that just a year ago, along with neighboring Rhineland-Palatinate, suffered devastating floods that cost cities, bridges, roads and 185 lives. Then the climatic catastrophe was reflected in the fury of overflowing rivers; now, in the forecast of exceeding the absolute national maximum, the 41.2 degrees recorded in July 2019, in the Rhenish city of Duisburg.
In addition to the emergency situation in these theoretically ‘fresh’ areas – although they are diminishing – in central or northern Europe, there are fires in the countries most prone to wildfires in southern Europe. In Tuscany, Italy, residents of several cities have been evacuated, while suffocating days are being experienced in cities such as Florence and Perugia.
Thousands of olive trees have been burned on the island of Crete, in a context of 1,850 hectares of burning forest. Greece, a country that suffers year after year from the ravages of the flames, was a kind of oasis in this context, with temperatures that for the Hellenic summer could be described as mild -30 degrees. An increase, although not dramatic, in temperatures in Greece is expected towards the end of the week; for Northern Europe, relief is not expected until the end of next week.
“Heat waves are becoming more common as a result of climate change,” said UN Meteorological Organization Secretary General Petteri Taalas of Geneva. For this organism, a “doping” effect has been produced in the atmosphere, because it is injected with more greenhouse gases than it can handle. Even if climate change stops, extreme heatwaves will be common until at least 2060, Taalas warned.
Simultaneously with the arrival of the ‘Hitzewelle’ in Germany, the foreign minister, the green Annalena Baerbock, warned of any decision that would suspend the climate fight because of the need for other crises – such as the energy crisis, precipitated by the war of Ukraine-.
The fight against climate change “cannot be delayed,” he declared in a speech to the so-called ‘Petersberg Dialogue’, which welcomes representatives from 40 countries and I consider in preparation for the climate conference -COP27- to be held in Egypt.
A report commissioned by the Minister of Economy and Climate, the also green Robert Habeck, estimates that the climate crisis has caused €80,000 million in damage to the first European power, caused by flooding or extreme heat.
Source: La Verdad
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