Spain nears record temps as heat wave bakes southern Europe

Temperatures in Spain soared above 45 degrees Celsius on Saturday, with Seville topping out at 46.5 degrees Celsius, just shy of the country’s all-time record of 46.9 Celsius from July 2017.

The persistent heat, spurred by hot air from Africa’s Sahara Desert, has fueled hundreds of deadly wildfires throughout the Mediterranean region, especially in Algeria, Turkey, Italy, and Greece.

“The heat wave we are experiencing now is very extreme and a lot of people are saying that it’s normal, as we are in summer. But it’s not, not this hot,” Dominic Royé, a climate scientist at the University of Santiago de Compostela, said.

The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) agreed, noting that the current temperatures “are extreme, and what we might expect from climate change.”

An anticyclone of winds, nicknamed “Lucifer” by the Italian media, has spawned sweltering temperatures throughout the country.

The Italian island of Sicily may have recorded Europe’s hottest recorded temperature of 48.8 degrees Celsius on Wednesday, but it has not yet been verified by the WMO. That record came in 1977, when Athens hit 48.0 degrees.

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