[ad_1]
Western France is facing a “heat apocalypse”, experts have warned, as extreme temperatures continue to hit much of Europe.
Temperatures could reach record highs in 15 regions of the South West, with firefighters battling blazes and thousands forced to evacuate, according to BBC.
The fires in Spain, Portugal and Greece have forced thousands of citizens to leave their homes.
Record temperatures are also expected in parts of the UK, which has its first red extreme heat warning.
Fires in France in recent days have forced more than 24,000 people to leave and take shelter in places set up for evacuees.
Six of them have been deployed in the area to help put out the flames. It seemed as if four or five passed over our heads, one releasing a great volley of water on the ground below.
#EFFIS Fire Danger Forecast for July 18
🔥Very Extreme Danger forecasted in:
➡️Large parts of #Spain🇪🇸, except in Catalonia and Galicia
➡️Occitanie, Pays de la Loire and Brittany, #France🇫🇷
➡️North Eastern #Portugal🇵🇹
➡Greek 🇬🇷Islands & east of Athens
➡Western #Turkey 🇹🇷 pic.twitter.com/jhhLL7pS6k— Copernicus EMS (@CopernicusEMS) July 18, 2022
Jean-Luc Gleyze, president of the Gironde region, told the BBC that the fires had continued to grow in La-Teste-de-Buch and Landiras due to hot and windy weather, making it difficult for firefighters to they controlled them.
“They have to fight against this fire that is growing and growing. More villages will have to be evacuated”he added.
The heat wave has prompted warnings of what a meteorologist described to the AFP news agency as “a heat apocalypse” in some parts of the southwest.
In Spain and Portugal, more than 1,000 deaths have been caused by extreme heat in recent days.
A third of the continent still remains at extreme fire risk, according to national meteorological office IPMA. This is due to severe or extreme drought conditions almost everywhere, says the BBC’s Portugal correspondent Alison Roberts.
After the trauma of June 2017, when 66 lives were lost in the fires, the top priority of emergency and civil defense commanders has been to act early to protect life, leading to the evacuation of over 860 people from their homes in the north and south place, she adds.
This heat wave is the second to hit parts of southwestern Europe in recent weeks.
Heat waves have become more frequent, more intense and last longer due to human-induced climate change. The world has already warmed by about 1.1 degrees C since the start of the industrial age, and temperatures will continue to rise unless governments around the world make big cuts in emissions.
Enrique Sanchez, Dean of the Faculty of Environmental Sciences and Biochemistry at the University of Castilla-La Mancha in Spain, told the BBC that heatwaves will soon become normal.
top channel
[ad_2]
Source link
