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More than 20 towns in France have recorded their highest ever May temperatures and the UK set a national heat record amid an extreme early-summer heat event that could see the mercury climb to 40C in parts of Spain by the end of the week.
The UK’s Met Office said the country’s all-time record for May was broken when a temperature of 33.5C was recorded at Heathrow near London, with highs of up to 35C expected later on Monday and on Tuesday.
Hundreds more May records are likely to be set in France, Spain and the UK, forecasters said, with temperatures exceeding norms by 12 or 13 degrees in what Météo France described as a “premature, remarkable and long” heat episode expected to last several more days.
France’s national weather agency said the record temperatures were caused by a heat dome, with hot air from Morocco trapped under an area of high pressure, adding that Europe could expect such events “more and more often, more and more intense, and earlier and earlier”.
Models have already estimated that, with the effects of climate breakdown, June heatwaves are now about 10 times more likely in Europe than they were in the preindustrial era, and the same trajectory is becoming visible for May.
“This extension of the heatwave season is entirely characteristic of the effects of climate change,” Robert Vautard, a climate researcher, told Agence France-Presse. “Eventually, we will be seeing similar heat events in April and October.”
Thirty-one French départements have been placed on high-temperature alert until Tuesday, including eight on level orange, the second-highest, requiring residents to “take precautions”. It was first time the country’s national heat warning system has been activated during May since it was introduced in 2004.
Météo France said in a bulletin on Monday that temperatures could climb locally to 36C. “Towns in the west of the country are likely to see temperatures several degrees higher than ever recorded in May,” it said.
Among France’s larger cities, Paris hit 32.6C on Sunday and is expected to reach 33C on Monday, while Bordeaux sweltered in 34.2C. The south-western town of Brive-la-Gaillarde registered 35.3C, nearly two degrees hotter than its previous May record.
A man died during a 10km running race in the Paris suburb of Maisons-Alfort on Sunday, civil defence services said, reportedly after suffering a heart attack, while 10 more runners had to be taken to hospital in critical condition after the race.
Previous May highs were exceeded locally on Sunday all along France’s Atlantic coast at weather stations including St-Nazaire, where 31.8C was recorded on Sunday, Noirmoutier (31.3C) and Brest in Brittany (29C), the national weather agency said.
The hot spell in Spain – where temperatures in some southern areas hit 38C over the weekend, between 5C and 10C higher than normal – is also expected to continue through the week, said Rubén del Campo of the state meteorological office Aemet.
“The other really notable thing is that the situation is going to last until at least the end of the week. In fact, it could get even hotter on Thursday and Friday, with temperatures of at least 34C across most of the country,” del Campo said.
Widespread highs of 36-38C in the Guadiana, Guadalquivir and Ebro valleys are expected between Wednesday and Friday, he added, saying that “in some of those areas, temperatures could reach 40C”.
Del Campo also said much of the country could expect so-called “tropical nights”, in which the night-time temperature does not drop below 20C.
Parts of the UK could enter a heatwave, with temperatures exceeding 26C to 28C – depending on the location – for three days. In France, night-time temperatures must also stay above a certain level for an official heatwave to be declared.
