Europe is burning as record-breaking heat wave moves east and brings blazes to Greece, Italy and France
By Rob Picheta, CNN
Millions of people across Europe were sweltering in yet more extreme heat on Wednesday, as raging wildfires tore through the countryside, forcing thousands from their homes and blanketing parts of Italy, Greece and France in smoke.
After temperatures smashed records in the UK on Tuesday, the extreme heat is moving east across the continent, leaving a trail of destruction in many rural areas and exposing a lack of preparedness, even in some of Europe’s biggest cities.
Temperatures of 100 degrees Fahrenheit (nearly 38 degrees Celsius) are forecast in Germany, Hungary and Italy today or in the coming days.
The European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS) said 19 European countries were at “extreme danger” for wildfires on Wednesday, across an expanse stretching from Portugal and Spain in the south-west to Albania and Turkey in the south-east.
On the outskirts of the Greek capital, Athens, firefighters are tackling vast blazes where wind is whipping up flames and smoke, and hampering containment efforts. At least 600 people have been evacuated, including from a children’s hospital, authorities said.
“Our top priority remains the safeguarding of human lives. But also that of vital public infrastructure as well as citizens’ properties,” Greek Fire Service spokesperson Ioannis Artopoios said, during a televised briefing in the early hours of Wednesday morning.
Huge clouds of smoke remain visible in the city on Wednesday, despite the efforts of hundreds of firefighters. Romanian fire crews have been drafted in to assist the operation.
Blazes are also being tackled in parts of Italy. Wildfires in Tuscany caused gas tanks to explode and forced evacuations overnight, according to the regional President Eugenio Giani. In Alsdorf, western Germany, three residents and two firefighters were injured in a blaze on Tuesday, and much of the country is primed for more fires as temperatures rise on Wednesday.
In France, aircraft continued to dump water over burning landscapes. Fires have been raging there for a week now, though they advanced “very little” on Tuesday night in the Gironde region, according to local authorities. Smoke swirled over the Brennilis nuclear power plant in Brittany on Wednesday morning.
There was some respite in the UK, where temperatures dipped from an all-time high of 40.3 C (104.5 F) on Tuesday back into the 20s. But some residential areas around London were left in ruins after fires broke out across parts of the capital, stretching the fire service to its limits.
“Yesterday was the busiest day for the fire service in London since the second world war,” London’s mayor Sadiq Khan told Sky News on Wednesday. London had no available fire engines at one point in the afternoon amid unprecedented demand, a senior fireman with the London Fire Brigade’s special rescue team told CNN.
‘Apocalyptic’ scenes as Europe adjusts to new reality
As countries around the region tackle the immediate effects of the extreme heat, many are also grappling with a climate reality that has brought new risks to the continent.
Hot records are outpacing cool records by more than 10-to-1 globally this year, according to data from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Globally, 188 all-time heat records were broken versus 18 cool records through July 16. Studies have showed that extreme heat will increase in frequency, intensity and duration because of the climate crisis.
“We learn the hard way that we must prepare better & proteclit our forests & soils to stop living these nightmares each summer!” Virginijus Sinkevičius, the EU Commissioner for Environment, Oceans and Fisheries, wrote on Twitter on Wednesday.
Residents of some badly-affected regions of Europe have hit out at their leaders as the extreme temperatures devastated their areas.
A campsite owner told CNN affiliate BFMTV on Tuesday that “we have demands” for President Emmanuel Macron, who will be making a visit to the ravaged southwest on Wednesday.
“We hope that he will be able to very quickly order the public services to help us, to support us in the administrative steps to put the camp site in working order as soon as possible,” said Stephane Carella, co-owner of Pyla Camping whose site was destroyed by fires.
“Everything has gone up in smoke,” he said, with some 90% of his property affected by the fire. Carella described the remainders of the site as “apocalyptic.”
Until Tuesday, the threat of wildfires in the UK was rarely considered by politicians or residents. But many locations of southern England were engulfed in smoke during the country’s hottest day on record.
A resident of Wennington, a London suburb affected by a fire on Tuesday, told CNN that the gardens on his street were “like a tinder box” in the days leading up to the fire.
Stock lost his home, eight chickens and two beehives when the fire broke out.
“I didn’t sleep last night. I was in the hotel room thinking how bad it could have gone,” he said. “I just thank god that everyone got out alive.”
He added: “We’ve lost everything. But when we get back, we can clear the site, put some fences up, get a couple of mobile homes and we’ll start again.”
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CNN’s Elinda Labropoulou, Chris Stern, Nina dos Santos, Robert Shackleford, Madalena Araujo, Alex Hardie, Bianca Nobilo and Joseph Ataman contributed reporting.
