Heatwave: 42 departments on orange alert Sunday; heat will "rise a notch in the South," warns Météo-France
The heatwave that has been ongoing since Friday , the second of the summer to hit France, extended on Sunday, August 10, to almost the entire southern half of the country, with 42 departments placed on orange heatwave alert by Météo-France.
"On Sunday, following on from previous days, the heat will rise again in the South," warned the national forecasting service in its latest bulletin on Saturday.
The thermometer should therefore climb "frequently" to 40°C, or even "exceed" it, in Hérault, Var and the south of the departments of Ardèche and Drôme, the institute notes.
At the hottest part of the day, 42°C are also expected in Nîmes and 40°C in Perpignan, with peaks of 38°C in Bordeaux and Toulouse in the afternoon.
From the Pyrénées-Atlantiques to the Jura, and from Charente-Maritime to the Alpes-Maritimes, 42 departments in the southern half of the country have been placed on orange heatwave alert, and five others further centrally, from Vendée to Côte-d'Or, on yellow alert.
This episode, which requires "particular vigilance, particularly for sensitive or exposed people" , underlines Météo-France, could intensify further at the start of the week.
“Very high” risk of fires in VaucluseOn Saturday, 42.2°C was recorded in Tiranges, in Haute-Loire, and 39°C in Lyon, in a region where the mercury is expected to drop "slightly" on Sunday according to the latest forecast bulletin.
After a first heatwave this year from June 19 to July 4, this is the 51st recorded in France since 1947. According to Météo-France, which observes "an acceleration in the occurrence of heatwaves" linked to climate change, the country has only experienced two summers without this type of episode over the past sixteen years.
The institute also classified Vaucluse as at "very high" risk for fires on Sunday. Ten departments around the Mediterranean and its hinterland, and five others in the Centre-West, will be at "high" risk.
In the Aude region, the fire which has covered 16,000 hectares during the week, 13,000 of which have burned according to civil security, is not expected to be "under control" before Sunday evening, due to weather conditions "close to those on the day the fire started" , the firefighters warned, with a dry, hot wind blowing at 50 km/h against a backdrop of heatwave.
For its part, the SNCF has cancelled several round trips on the Bordeaux-Marseille, Paris-Limoges-Toulouse and Paris-Clermont Intercités lines, fearing "potential air conditioning failures" on its oldest carriages due to rising temperatures.
The World with AFP
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