Europe braces for wave of wildfires as prospects rise for ‘overload’

Greece, Italy and parts of central Europe were the most vulnerable to wildfires in the coming weeks, EU officials said, as experts warned that simultaneous blazes could overwhelm firefighting efforts, Financial Times notes.

Maria Zuber, head of the unit at the EU’s Emergency Response Coordination Centre, said there was a risk that “we will have all Europe on fire”, if prolonged heatwaves leave the continent vulnerable to more blazes while struggling to extinguish existing ones.

But Zuber said she believed the EU’s crisis hub could cope with the scenario. “Last year, we had so many fires but we did respond to everything. I think we will respond to every request, maybe not fulfil the request.”

Following the intense fires in France and Spain, which continue to smoulder, wildfires on the Greek island of Crete caused the deaths of two firefighters and the evacuation of 8,000 people on Thursday.

Strong winds fuelled fires on the Cycladic islands of Paros and Andros, where evacuations were also ordered across multiple villages.

“Now we see [wildfires] will go to Greece [and] Italy will face risk at the beginning of August,” Zuber said.

Officials at the ERCC, which delivers firefighting resources, personnel and data to 27 member states and 10 other participating nations, expect a busy summer that could surpass the intensity of a record 2025.

“We had 19 requests [for assistance] last year during the wildfire season. We expect we could beat this record,” said Zuber.

As the immediate threat waned in France, about half of the 220,000 people who evacuated the Gironde region in the south-west were allowed to return home.

But French interior minister Laurent Nuñez said “the situation remains complicated” and “a small improvement does not mean that we are letting our guard down”.

In Spain, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez lifted the national emergency status in areas west of Madrid on Thursday but also expressed caution.

Human-induced climate change made the extreme weather behind the latest wildfires at least twice as likely in France and at least 20 times more likely in Spain, a study by the World Weather Attribution group of scientists said on Friday.

Guillermo Rein, professor of fire science at Imperial College London, said Europe was “still in the peak of wildfire season” and typically it would extend into early September or even later in parts of southern Europe.

He flagged the potential for “Europe-wide overload”, as successive heatwaves, dry vegetation and winds continue to generate large wildfires across several nations.

Demands on national firefighting forces could leave Europe without resources to share, particularly aerial cover, he said. “The loss of this mutual aid would significantly reduce Europe’s ability to suppress the largest wildfires.”

Zuber said the scale of the threat was the reason for Europe’s desire to build an independent fleet of planes capable of tackling wildfires. The EU has ordered 12 Canadair water bombers but delivery of the first planes is not expected until 2028.

The extent of this year’s fire season, even in countries that had heavily invested in firefighting, showed the “limits of what can be achieved” through measures to adapt to climate change, said Thomas Smith, a scientist at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

“As the climate continues to warm, extreme fire weather is becoming more frequent and more severe, increasing the likelihood of the large, intense wildfires we have seen this summer,” he said.

Spain and southern France had already invested heavily in wildfire preparedness and management, he noted, “but there are only so many options for reducing fuels and modifying landscapes”.

European cities and towns are particularly vulnerable to wildfire risk as 15 per cent of their land is where populated communities border vegetation, compared with a global average of 4.7 per cent, according to a report published in the journal Nature.

The risk was also set to increase over the coming decades in both temperate forests and boreal or northern forests, according to modelling by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts.

While the global burnt area was projected to decline because of less burning of the savannah and land-use changes, “this masks strong regional differences. European forests are among the regions where we see increasing extreme fire activity”, said scientist Joe McNorton.

This was partly because the northern and temperate forests, found across countries such as France, Germany and Poland, were expected to accumulate more vegetation under warmer and longer growing conditions — while also being exposed to more “fire-conducive weather”.

Even over the coming weeks, such areas were already at higher risk, said Imperial’s Rein. “It’s so, so dry, I worry about the UK and northern parts of France. They are lacking any natural resistance to fire right now.”

England on track for record heat-related deaths this summer, official data shows

England is on track to record its highest ever number of heat-related deaths this summer after the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) announced that an estimated 2,877 people had died in the May and June heatwaves, The Guardian reports.

The record was set in 2022 with 2,985 deaths, and August, traditionally the hottest month, is yet to arrive. The health secretary, Yvette Cooper, said: “My thoughts are with all those who have lost loved ones as a result of the long and intense heatwaves.”

The UKHSA analysis estimated there were 753 deaths in the the heatwave from 24 to 27 May and a further 2,124 between 21 and 28 June. The total is almost double the figure for the whole summer in 2025.

Heatwaves are made more intense and more likely by the fossil-fuel-driven climate crisis; the heatwave that affected western Europe at the end of June was the most severe and widespread ever. The heat in 2027 will be exacerbated by a looming super El Niño weather system and temperatures will continue to rise until carbon emissions are cut to net zero.

Some ambulance services reported a record number of calls during the heatwaves.

During the June heatwave in England a new high temperature for the month, of 38C, was recorded at Lingwood, Norfolk, while the 31.5C recorded at Kew Gardens in May was a new record for that month.

Rhine drought strands ships and forces German production shutdowns

The drought means that vessels can carry significantly less cargo along the Rhine, requiring more ships to transport the same volume and making it more expensive
Photo: Reuters

Water levels on the Rhine have dropped to near the lowest in eight years due to extreme heat and drought in Europe, disrupting the flow of goods and causing manufacturers to cut production, Financial Times reports.

The benchmark level of Germany’s most important inland trade corridor has nearly fallen to 25 centimetres in recent days, close to a record low recorded in 2018.

The drought means that vessels can carry significantly less cargo along the Rhine, requiring more ships to transport the same volume and making it more expensive, the latest example of the economic costs of extreme heat in western Europe.

The longer shipping is restricted, the more the strain increases, Marc Schattenberg, an economist at Deutsche Bank, said. “The volumes that would have to be shifted are so large that replacing them by rail or road would be difficult, especially as some important connections are currently undergoing construction work,” he said.

In Germany, temperatures reached towards 40C again this week after a record-breaking June heatwave. The low-water period started “unusually early” this year, according to the Federal Waterways and Shipping Administration.

Last month was the hottest June on record on the fastest-warming continent as a result of climate change.

Some economists have warned that disruption due to low water levels could shave as much as 0.2 percentage points off German growth.

German chemical companies, such as BASF, Covestro and Evonik, have plants concentrated along the banks of the river and are particularly exposed to further disruption.

Heavy industry located on or near the Rhine is facing complications shifting materials via inland waterways. Thyssenkrupp was forced to limit hot metal production in Duisburg after facing disrupted delivery of raw materials, but said that customer supply was “currently not at risk”.

The Danube has also fallen to a record low in Hungary, forcing the nuclear power plant which supplies nearly half the country’s electricity to shut down within the next few days, the government said on Thursday. Prime Minister Péter Magyar said the situation was “unprecedented” and asked the population to refrain from using electricity in the peak evening hours.

Romania has also been forced to shut down one of the two reactors of the Cernavodă nuclear power plant, which also takes cooling water from the Danube.

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