Snowball fights in July. Mulled wine instead of wine coolers. Thermostats set on high. Spring has come and gone, fall approaches -- and Europeans from Oslo to Budapest are still waiting for the summer.
Much of Europe woke up to yet another day of chilly temperatures and rain on Thursday, adding to the weeks of miserable weather gripping Europe from Scandinavia down to parts of the Balkans.
And this, in a continent that had feared a recurrence of last summer's heat wave, which killed thousands.
This year's May was fitful, and last month promised a summer that could go either way. But except for southern Europe, this month has been wet and glacial.
On many days, temperatures have been half that of last year, when the mercury sat at 35?C or higher for weeks, resulting in crowded swimming pools, record ice cream sales and stores without fans and air conditioners.
Meteorologists say the comparison with last summer is misleading because it was unusually hot and dry in much of Europe.
"It's a little cooler than it should be but it's not too bad," said Vienna weatherman Ernst Rudel of the past few weeks, describing the rains sweeping Austria this summer as "a little more precipitation than normal."
But the wacky weather has in some areas led to virtual winter.
Instead of hiking, tourists in Germany's Bavarian Alps have worked up a sweat with snowball fights and sleigh rides after heavy snowfalls that dusted peaks -- and in some cases valleys under 2,000m.
In central Germany's Thuringia forest, guests who recently gathered for an open-air theater performance clasped icy fingers around cups of mulled wine usually served at winter apres-ski parties. Apparently it's no attraction: Stefanie Loeser of the nearby regional tourist office in Erfurt said frosty temperatures and two weeks of rain have hit tourism hard.
Britons -- whose summer weather has been the envy of no one over the years -- have even less to laugh about than usual.
The cold snap prompted the British Gas company to put its winter emergency contingency plan into operation to meet a surge in demand from people turning on central heating.
Shrewsbury in northwest England had a temperature of 11.4?C on July 8 -- the coldest ever for the month. To the south, the town of Wittering, near Cambridge, absorbed 12.2cm of rainfall between July 1 and July 8 -- two and one-half times the monthly average.
The sun has shone a miserly three days this month in most of Britain, and on Thursday much of the country was murky and drizzly yet again. It was a particularly bad sign, being St. Swithin's Day, when folklore holds that rain means another 40 consecutive days of downpours.
Elliot Frisby, a spokesman for the VisitBritain tourism board, maintained a stiff upper lip. "We don't sell Britain as a sun, sea and sand destination," he said.
Persistent rain also left parts of Scandinavia gasping for relief.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not