Hundreds of people have fled wildfires in Greece as southern Europe was on Wednesday bracing for the third day in a row of extreme heat.
Dozens of homes were gutted by fire in two towns west of Athens as fire brigades battled a third blaze on the island of Rhodes on Tuesday night.
Greek media reported that the fire broke out in a forest area between the villages of Apollonas and the village of Laerma on the popular tourist island. The blaze is said to have begun on a rubbish dump and quickly spread, according to Greek newspaper Proto Thema.
Fire brigade spokesman Vassilis Varthakogiannis said crews remained “on a level of high alert” following the evacuation of hundreds of local residents in the affected regions. Four aircraft sent from Italy and France were set to join firefighting efforts later on Wednesday.
Air water bombers were continuing to douse flames after wildfires burned for a third day in the towns of Mandra, west of the capital, and Loutraki, close to the Corinth canal which separates mainland Greece from the Peloponnese.
The blaze, which broke out on Monday in the Dervenochoria region, about 30km north of Athens, spread fast as it was fanned by erratic winds.
The Acropolis in Athens - the country’s most popular tourist attraction - was closed to tourists for four hours on Sunday due to the extreme heat.
Meanwhile, heatwave red alerts remained in place for cities across Italy, Spain and the Balkans ahead of extreme temperatures this afternoon.
Temperatures reached a high of 44C on the Mediterranean island of Sardinia on Tuesday while Rome saw the mercury top out at 40C. Tourists in the capital were pictured trying to keep cool by splashing in fountains and standing under giant fans set up outside the Colosseum.
France’s weather service, Météo-France, on Wednesday put nine departments in the south-east on a high heatwave alert. Temperatures of 26C were recorded in Montpellier and Béziers, and 25C in Marseille and Nice at 5am local time.
Americans were also facing a medley of extreme weather as the southwestern city of Phoenix, Arizona recorded its 19th consecutive day in which the daily high exceeded 43C, breaking its all-time record of 18 days. Temperatures also climbed to 53C in California's Death Valley on Monday.
Beijing logged its 28th consecutive day of temperatures running at more than 35C, setting a new record for the number of high-temperature days in a year. It came days after a remote township in the country's north western Xinjiang region reported a temperature of 52.5C, smashing the national record.
The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) said the heatwave in the northern hemisphere was set to intensify.
Senior heat advisor John Nairn said the scorching conditions in Europe were “not the normal weather systems of the past” and had occurred “as a consequence of climate change”.
Extreme temperatures will grow in frequency, duration and intensity as a result of global warming, he added.
The World Health Organization's regional director for Europe, Hans Henri P. Kluge, said the world must look ahead while adapting to the “new reality” of killer heat waves and other extreme weather.
“There is a desperate and urgent need for regional and global action to effectively tackle the climate crisis, which poses an existential threat to the human race,” he said.
