Hundreds of firefighters yesterday battled to contain wildfires in southern France as a heat wave brought record-breaking temperatures to parts of Europe, killing at least three people in Italy.
In the Gard region, where France’s highest temperature on record was registered on Friday at 45.9°C, scores of fires burned about 600 hectares of land and destroyed several houses and vehicles, emergency services said.
More than 700 firefighters and 10 aircraft were mobilized to tackle the fires in the Gard, some of which caused sections of motorways to be temporarily closed.
Photo: AFP
Several firefighters were hurt, but no serious injuries were reported.
French media said that a man had been arrested for deliberately starting fires in one Gard village.
The extreme heat was expected to ease yesterday in southern France, but highs were still forecast at close to 40°C.
Further north, Paris was due to experience its hottest day of the heat wave so far with a predicted high of 37°C.
Authorities in the capital maintained a ban on driving older cars to curb heat wave-related pollution.
The World Meteorological Organization this week said that this year is on track to be among the world’s hottest years, and 2015 to this year would then be the hottest five-year period on record.
The European heat wave is “absolutely consistent” with extremes linked to the effects of greenhouse gas emissions, it added.
Britain yesterday could have seen its hottest day of the year so far, with temperatures expected to reach up to 35°C, the Met Office said.
For a fourth consecutive day, temperatures above 43°C were forecast across Spain.
Forty of Spain’s 50 regions have been placed under weather alert, with seven of them considered to be at extreme risk, the national meteorological agency said.
In the northeastern city of Girona, the mercury reached a record high of 43.9°C on Friday, the Catalan city’s highest-ever temperature on record.
Firefighters managed to contain 90 percent of the wildfires that raged across 60km2 of land in northeastern Tarragona Province, the Catalan government said, but two other wildfires in the central Toledo region were still burning.
The heat killed at least three people in central and northern Italy, while hospitals in Milan saw a 35 percent rise in emergency visits due to heat-related conditions, local media reported.
Demand for power in the city surged as people cranked up air-conditioning, causing sporadic blackouts.
Temperatures are forecast to ease in the coming days, but would remain hot.
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