High temperature and thunderstorm warnings for Ireland
A high temperature warning – with temperatures up to 29 degrees in many counties – remains in place for Ireland until Saturday morning, with Met Éireann warning of heavy and thunderous showers.
It will remain humid and warm throughout today, with a mix of sunshine and scattered showers.
Saturday will be markedly cooler with temperatures of 19 to 23 degrees.
Although Ireland is not under the heat dome, or area of high pressure trapping heat over continental Europe, temperatures reached a high of 32.1 degrees in Athenry, Co Galway, on Thursday.
There had been predictions that a new heat record could be set to beat the 33.3 degrees recorded in Co Kilkenny in 1887. In Northern Ireland, a high of 30.8 degrees was recorded in Castlederg in Co Tyrone.
Met Éireann has issued a yellow thunderstorm for all Connacht, and counties Cavan, Donegal, Monaghan, Clare, Tipperary, Kildare, Laois, Longford, Meath, Offaly, Westmeath from 9am until 6pm on Friday.
European heatwave linked to ‘human-caused climate change’
The record-breaking heatwave engulfing Western Europe would have been “virtually impossible” without human-caused climate change, which has made this week’s soaring night-time temperatures 100 times more likely than they would have been just two decades ago, scientists said on Friday.
“Over the region studied, this heatwave is the most severe ever recorded,” the World Weather Attribution (WWA) group of climate scientists said in an analysis. Britain recorded a record-high temperature for June on Thursday, amid the deadly heatwave that has killed dozens, disrupted power supplies and shut schools and cultural landmarks.
Global warming has worsened Europe’s heatwaves in just a few decades, the WWA analysis found. A similar heatwave in June 1976 would have been around 3.5 degrees cooler than this one, WWA said.
Of more than 800 European cities analysed, 45 per cent have recorded, or are forecast to record, their highest heat stress levels for late June, the research found. Heat stress occurs when the body cannot cool itself through sweating.
In parts of France, overnight temperatures have stayed above 20 degrees for more than a week — a temperature threshold known as a “tropical night” — with some nights recording minimum temperatures of nearly 30 degrees.
Disappearing Arctic ice contributing to heatwave - Thorne
The heatwave that has consumed much of western Europe has pushed temperatures well above 35 degrees for more than 100 million people and triggered weather warnings in more than 20 countries.
Europe is particularly affected because it is the fastest-warming continent, according to the European Union’s Copernicus climate change monitoring service, warming at more than twice the global average.
“As Europe’s climate continues to warm, heatwaves are projected to occur earlier and later in the year beyond summer,” according to Copernicus.
Peter Thorne, director of the Irish Climate Analysis and Research Units, said this is in part due to climate change’s impact on the Arctic region.
With ice caps “melting rapidly”, the reflective surface of the northernmost part of the planet is disappearing, he said, and being replaced with land and sea that absorbs radiation more easily. This extreme weather “is hugely concerning” for Thorne.
“Undoubtedly, this is proof of human-induced climate change at work. This is our new reality and it’s not going anywhere,” he said.
Parisians temporarily banned from drinking in public
Parisians will be temporarily banned from drinking alcohol in public as hospitals in the capital buckle under a deadly heatwave gripping France and much of Europe.
“We are reaching a saturation point in hospital facilities,” the head of Paris police, Patrice Faure, said on Thursday. He warned the new measures, which include a ban on alcohol takeaway sales, were needed to stem increasing hospitalisations.
“I must ensure that the pressure decreases,” Faure said.
The French health minister, Stéphanie Rist, on Thursday said the ambulance service in Paris had reported four times more cardiac arrests than normal over a 24-hour period. Young people were also suffering cardiac arrests, she said.
The public drinking ban begins at noon on Friday and lasts until 7am Saturday, and then repeats the same hours from Saturday to Sunday.
Temperatures in Paris hit a June record of 40.9 degrees on Wednesday and pushed close to 40 degrees on Thursday. At least 48 people have died in France from drowning since the start of the heatwave, and three young children have been killed by heat in cars.ming in the record-breaking heatwave.
France is forecast to face at least several more days of stifling heat.
