Heat record in United Kingdom, wildfires continue to ravage southern Europe | NOW

A temperature above 40 degrees was measured in the United Kingdom for the first time on Tuesday. In Belgium and Germany, heat records fell by a hair’s breadth. The heat caused many problems elsewhere in Europe, including forest fires. In France, Italy and Greece, the fire service has its hands full. Although the worst heat in Spain and Portugal seems to be over, wildfires are still raging there.

In the London area, the fire service received five times as many calls on Tuesday afternoon. Mayor Sadiq Khan spoke of a critical situation given the pressure on the fire service.

Calculation models from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) assume nearly a thousand extra deaths this month as a result of the heat wave. Heat records were broken in at least 34 places in the United Kingdom on Tuesday.

In Italy, wildfires broke out in Tuscany and near Rome, Milan and Trieste. By mid-afternoon, a 365-hectare area just outside Pisa had already gone up in flames, said Eugenio Giani, the governor of Tuscany.

Athens area falls prey to forest fires again

In the French department of Gironde, the wildfires that have raged in the Bordeaux area since 12 July have become the largest wildfire in thirty years. An area the size of Eindhoven has since gone up in flames, forcing approximately 34,000 people to leave their homes.

Forest fires have also started again around the Greek capital Athens, an area that already had to deal with a huge sea of ​​flames last year. Some suburbs have been evacuated by order of the authorities.

Spain is still struggling with about thirty wildfires spread across the country. In the regions of Galicia and Castile and Leon, the authorities are closely monitoring the situation. 70,000 hectares of nature have already gone up in flames this year, more than twice as much as the average this decade. In some parts of Spain it has not rained for almost half a year.