{"id":508511,"date":"2026-06-19T20:46:08","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T20:46:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/508511\/"},"modified":"2026-06-19T20:46:08","modified_gmt":"2026-06-19T20:46:08","slug":"europe-swelters-as-temperatures-in-france-could-hit-40c","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/508511\/","title":{"rendered":"Europe swelters as temperatures in France could hit 40C"},"content":{"rendered":"

Much of Western Europe is sweltering in a gruelling heatwave with temperatures expected to continue rising in the coming days, likely shattering yet more records.<\/p>\n

France has been hit hard, with hundreds of schools tweaking their timetables to cope.<\/p>\n

Forecasters warned of an “intense and long-lasting” heatwave that could see temperatures in the Paris region soar above 40C for the first time on a June day.<\/p>\n

It is estimated that more than half of France’s population is dealing with scorching temperatures.<\/p>\n

Around 41 million of the country’s 69 million residents are affected by an orange heat alert issued by the weather office, the second-highest category, according to a calculation based on population figures from the national statistics agency.<\/p>\n

The forecaster urged residents to be “very cautious” and said the conditions would be “widespread, prolonged and intense”.<\/p>\n

\"Children
\nChildren cool off in the French city of Nice<\/p>\n

President Emmanuel Macron called for “great vigilance” and for “taking care of the oldest, the most vulnerable”.<\/p>\n

Health Minister Stephanie Rist urged young people to be “really careful with alcohol and physical activity” as France gears up for its annual “La Fete de la Musique” on Sunday, a nationwide music festival when millions of people usually dance in the streets nationwide.<\/p>\n

The country has just experienced its hottest spring since records began in 1900, with the average nationwide temperature from March to May around 1.7C above the norm.<\/p>\n

Across the continent, authorities are ramping up warnings of extreme weather.<\/p>\n

German forecasters said that parts of the country needed to be on alert for thunderstorms, hail and heavy rain over the weekend.<\/p>\n

Meteorologists confirmed that England and Wales had already experienced their hottest spring on record, though temperatures in Britain are not expected to be as intense as in continental Europe.<\/p>\n

Scientists say that human-driven climate change is amplifying such extremes, with periods of extreme heat, droughts and floods becoming more intense and frequent.<\/p>\n

\"A
\nA man seeks relief from the heat in the German capital, Berlin<\/p>\n

The heatwave is the second of the year for tens of millions of people in Western Europe.<\/p>\n

Britain, France, Switzerland, Germany and Spain have all raised alert levels for the coming days, as have some cities in northern and central Italy.<\/p>\n

The UK’s Met Office said there was a 40% chance of beating the record temperature for a June day, set in 1976.<\/p>\n

Spain’s civil protection agency warned of a prolonged spell of extreme heat affecting most of the country, including the Balearic Islands, from Sunday and through much of next week.<\/p>\n

With climate change, “we’re seeing more extremes of temperatures, we’re breaking records more frequently”, Alex Deakin from the UK Met Office said.<\/p>\n

“When you get hot spells, they’re that much hotter. And when you get rainy spells, they’re that much rainier,” he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Much of Western Europe is sweltering in a gruelling heatwave with temperatures expected to continue rising in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":508512,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[246,61,60,82],"class_list":["post-508511","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-environment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/508511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=508511"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/508511\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/508512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=508511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=508511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=508511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}