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Italy may have recorded Europe’s highest temperature on record

By
Joshua Rhett Miller
Published Aug. 13, 2021
Updated Aug. 13, 2021, 2:20 p.m. ET

The Italian island of Sicily may have reached the hottest temperature ever recorded in Europe this week — just shy of a blistering 120 degrees, officials said.

The town of Floridia, near Syracuse in Sicily, reported a mercury reading of 119.8 degrees Fahrenheit on Wednesday, which, if confirmed, would be an all-time record, eclipsing the previous mark of 118.4 degrees in Athens in 1977.

A World Meteorological Organization official said Friday that the process of verifying the potential record could take up to two months.

As the country sizzles, Italian authorities have issued health alerts in Florence and Bologna for Friday and Saturday.

Neighboring Spain is also bracing for record high temps of up to 116.6 degrees Saturday — which would break its national record high of 116.4 degrees set in Cordoba in July 2017.

Members of the public relax and swim on the free beach on Aug. 11, 2021 in Arenella, Italy.
Members of the public relax and swim on the free beach on Aug. 11, 2021, in Arenella, Italy. Stefano Guidi/Getty Images

An ongoing heat wave in the region has plagued residents in many Southern European countries, along with deadly wildfires in Greece, Turkey, Italy and Algeria.

In Greece, a new fire erupted Friday near where a massive wildfire already destroyed forests some 10 days earlier. The county’s prime minister said Thursday the fires were the greatest ecological disaster in Greece in decades.


At least one firefighter has been killed and 20 people have been hurt. One local official described the ravaging infernos last week as a “biblical catastrophe.”

Wildfires in Turkey have also killed at least eight people, while at least 69 others died from massive blazes in Algeria.

Germany, meanwhile, is continuing to recover from devastating floods last month that killed more than 180 people, marking the nation’s worst natural disaster in more than 50 years, Reuters reported.

The thermometer of a pharmacy indicates 44°C in downtown Rome on August 12, 2021.
The thermometer of a pharmacy indicates 44°C or 111°F in downtown Rome on Aug. 12, 2021. AFP via Getty Images

New video shows flood victims in western Germany saying they expect more extreme weather in the future due to climate change.

“I firmly believe that there is more to come in the future,” Karl Hoebel told Reuters. “You don’t just have to look at this region, but elsewhere across the world and what’s happening there with fires, heat waves and so on. I do believe that we have only just seen the beginning.”

Sicily may have just smashed continental Europes heat record, the latest example of how climate change is causing extreme weather events around the globe.
Sicily may have just smashed continental Europe’s heat record, the latest example of how climate change is causing extreme weather events around the globe. Bloomberg via Getty Images

The German government and its 16 federal states announced Tuesday it would provide $35 billion to rebuild the impacted flood regions. But some residents say that won’t stop a repeat occurrence, which they believe is a certainty.

“It will happen again,” resident Cornelia Barthel told Reuters. “I am 100 percent convinced. That’s the reason why we don’t want to live in our apartment anymore. I believe it will happen again. They won’t be able to stop it.”

With Post wires