Europe in the grip of a heatwave, Climate Central: “Temperatures five times more likely due to climate change”

Brussels – The heatwave shows no sign of letting up in Western Europe, and temperatures, exceeding 40 degrees, are putting several countries under severe strain. The heatwave did not come out of the blue. The first wave had already arrived at the end of May, with temperatures 10–15°C above normal in western France, England, and Wales. An episode that Copernicus had described as “unusually early and intense” for the time of year. The second, more severe heatwave began on 22 June, in the middle of astronomical summer. Since then, nighttime temperatures in France have not fallen below critical levels. According to Météo-France, Tuesday 23 June was the hottest day ever recorded in the country, with an average daily and night-time temperature of 29.9°C, surpassing the previous all-time record of 29.4°C set on 25 July 2019 and 5 August 2003. The peak of the heatwave is expected today (24 June), with maximum temperatures of around 40–42°C.

Yesterday, the French Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu reported that, since 18 June, forty people have died by drowning in France. Many sought relief from the heat in waters where swimming is prohibited, such as unmonitored lakes, rivers, and canals. 

The Royal Meteorological Institute of Belgium (IRM) has explained that over the coming days, the weather will be dominated by a high-pressure system that will hold “a mass of scorching air” over France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg, forming what meteorologists call a “heat dome”. Thunderstorms will be virtually impossible: “The high pressure stifles them before they can develop.” From Friday onwards, the dome “will move towards central Europe, but the heat will not subside immediately,” because “the scorching air will remain over the region, although it will lose its stability and give way to increasingly likely thunderstorms over the weekend.” According to the IRM, next week will finally mark a turning point: cooler air currents from the Atlantic will once again prevail, albeit with a few disturbances. 

On the scientific front, Yale Climate Connections (Yale University’s climate science information service, which publishes analyses and updates on extreme weather events) highlights the findings of the research organisation World Weather Attribution: the deadly Mediterranean heatwave of July 2024 “would not have occurred without human-induced climate change,” and the British heatwave of July 2022 produced temperatures that, statistically speaking, would only be expected once every 500–1,500 years in the absence of greenhouse gas emissions. 

“We already know,” wrote Zack Labe, a climatologist at Climate Central (an independent US scientific organisation), on Bluesky on 22 June, “that these temperatures are made at least five times more likely by human-induced climate change.”

Dangerous and potentially historic extreme heat is forecast to impact parts of western Europe this week. We already know that these temperatures are made at least 5x more likely due to human-caused climate change. Stay safe!

Explore the attribution data at csi.climatecentral.org/climate-shif…

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— Zack Labe (@zacklabe.com) 22 June 2026 at 2.00 pm

According to the Yale Institute, humidity is relatively high, which could lead to some of the most dangerous heat indices ever recorded in several European countries. And heatwaves like this are becoming increasingly frequent, creating potentially life-threatening conditions for people without air conditioning. 

Yale Climate Connections goes on to explain a statistic that may seem surprising at first glance. Globally, deaths from the cold are still about nine times as many as those from the heat. But it is the trend that is cause for concern: even a small increase in the average temperature tends to increase heat-related deaths far more than it reduces cold-related deaths. A 2025 study published in Nature Medicine, which analysed 854 European cities, found that “without adaptation to heat, the increase in heat-related deaths consistently outweighs any reduction in cold-related deaths.”