Europe swelters under deadly 'Omega' heatwave, more records broken

[usonian]

I love Paris in the summer, when it sizzles.

https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/power-cuts-france-leave-thousands-sweltering-amid-scorching-heatwave-2026-06-24/

Temperatures in Paris hit a June record of 40.9 C, a day after France recorded its hottest day since records began nearly 80 years ago, when temperatures peaked at 44.3 C in the southwestern town of Pissos.

Italy's health ministry placed 16 cities — including Florence, Milan, Rome, Turin and Verona — on its highest heat alert, and warned the heatwave could intensify further, peaking between Sunday and Monday.

At least 48 people have died in France ​from drowning since the onset of the heatwave while trying to cool off, authorities said, and two young children were killed by heat in a car.

Spain reported two elderly people had died of heatstroke ​after days of temperatures exceeding 40 C, though conditions there began to ease on Wednesday following the hottest late-June days on record, according to national weather agency AEMET.

[progressoid]

1. 112 degrees?

[usonian]

2. Checks out. It has hit 110 in the Sierra Foothills

And more in the San Joachin valley.

[OKIsItJustMe]

3. UK heatwave: 40C in June must be wake-up call on climate crisis, scientists warn

https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/uk-weather-warnings-heatwave-climate-change-b3000931.html

Soaring temperatures should be seen as public health threat, expert warns as temperatures expected to smash records set in June 1976

Nick Ferris Climate Correspondent
Tuesday 23 June 2026 05:28 BST

Scientists are warning that politicians are failing to appreciate the magnitude of the climate crisis after the Met Office forecast that temperatures in the UK could hit 40C for just the second time since records began.

Rare red warnings have been issued over extreme temperatures that are this week set to hit record highs for June – smashing the record set in 1976 by several degrees.

The hot conditions will have major knock-on effects for health, schools, workers and transport, with experts warning that the predicted temperatures are “incredibly alarming” and should be seen as a public health threat.

“Our first 40C day was supposed to be a wake-up call, but clearly someone hit snooze,” said Professor Friederike Otto of Imperial College London, referring to the last time the UK hit 40C in 2022.

…

[Vogon_Glory]

4. Horrible. The only good thing about this is that American BS

artists are going to have a much harder time selling the rest of the First World that man-made climate change doesn’t exist.



What, Mr. Murdoch? You don’t believe that climate change exists? Why don’t we sit out here in the bright summer afternoon sunshine and talk about it?

A little sunshine won’t kill you.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

5. To Escape Record Heat, the French Are Taking to Water. Both Have Been Deadly.

PARIS DISPATCH
To Escape Record Heat, the French Are Taking to Water. Both Have Been Deadly.

Crowds are filling the Canal Saint-Martin in Paris, as temperatures soar above 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Forty people drowned while swimming in other waterways.


Swimming in Canal St. Martin in Paris on Tuesday. Samuel Boivin/NurPhoto, via Getty Images

By Mark Landler and Ségolène Le Stradic
Reporting from Paris
June 25, 2026
Updated 4:17 a.m. ET

Perched on the cobblestone bank of the Canal Saint-Martin in Paris, watching his children whoop and shout as they splashed in the murky water, Stéphane Guillaume looked like a rare Parisian who’d beaten the heat. But in the new normal of scorching-hot Paris summers, he said, any victory would be fleeting.

“It’s going to get worse every year,” said Mr. Guillaume, a 44-year-old computer engineer. “It’s very worrying because we’re already at the limit of what’s bearable.”

With temperatures across France soaring to the highest levels ever recorded in June — more than 40 degrees Celsius, or 104 degrees Fahrenheit — thousands of people are turning to extreme measures: jumping into canals, rivers and other waterways for relief. It can be a deadly choice. Forty people have drowned in heat wave-related accidents between June 18 and June 23, according to the French government.

Many in France still recall the summer of 2003, when nearly 15,000 people in the country, most of them older, died in a freak heat wave. That prompted recurring debates about how to weatherproof French society. The Ecologists, a green party, is proposing paid time off for those most exposed to climate disruptions, while decades of cultural resistance to air conditioning seems finally to be on the wane.

{snip}


Swimmers jumping from a bridge into Canal Saint-Martin. The area has been packed with Parisians trying to cool off during the heat wave. Samuel Boivin/NurPhoto, via Getty Images

{snip}

Mark Landler is the Paris bureau chief of The Times, covering France, as well as American foreign policy in Europe and the Middle East. He has been a journalist for more than three decades.

Ségolène Le Stradic a reporter and researcher for The Times, based in Paris.

[GPV]

7. If the AMOC shuts down, will that counter the heat, or just make for even

wider extremes?

[GPV]

6. My son is in Amsterdam -Noord. Their home is brick,

so heat is retained and continues to build. No AC, can't afford big fans, and upstairs there are no opposing wall windows so air movement is minimal. Been in the mid-90s outside, and even hotter inside. It's not good.

I asked if the country was looking at home improvements to deal with with the heat, but their funding mostly goes to holding back the encroaching sea.