Europe’s wild climate: Floods in Spain as heatwave bakes Greece

Europe is experiencing extreme weather at different ends of the spectrum this week, with a heatwave blanketing Turkey, Greece and Cyprus as Spain is hit by floods.

The heat is hitting countries around the eastern Mediterranean and the Aegean seas the hardest, with the mercury clocking 43C in Cyprus last week, prompting wildfires.

Turkey is seeing air temperatures soar eight to 12 degrees above seasonal norms, while Greece has today been forced to close the Athens Acropolis, its most visited tourist site, during the hottest hours of the day.

To the west, meanwhile, hundreds of firefighters in France are battling a powerful blaze to the north of Saint-Tropez which has caught crews off-guard.

But in a stark contrast, Spain has been battered by rainstorms, with Costa Blanca on the mainland and Majorca both being hit by severe flooding, with yet more rain expected to fall over the region on Wednesday.

Images on Tuesday showed Palma’s airport paralysed by floodwater, forcing the cancellation of more than 100 flights, while towns and cities in eastern Spain, including Murcia, were brought to a standstill as roads turned into rivers.

The weather extremes come as many Brits are planning to jet off to Europe for sunnier climes, and to escape what has been a deeply disappointing spring.

As parts of Europe swelter in the heat, temperatures in the UK have been consistently three to five degrees below the seasonal average – a trend which is expected to continue into July – while thundery showers are projected this week.

Meteorologists have blamed the low temperatures on the mid-Atlantic jet stream, a fast-moving atmospheric wind that is blowing cold air south from the Arctic. 

As Brits lament the spring chill, those living in Cyprus will be looking on with some envy as oppressive heat continues to bake the island.

A large fire broke out in the Paphos distric and spread quickly through dry grass, wild vegetation and trees, according to Euro News.

The blaze has so far forced the evacuation of three villages, while others have been put on high alert, with Fire Service Spokesperson Andreas Kettis warning that homes in the village of Psathi are under immediate threat from the flames.

The situation has gotten so dire, Nicos Christodoulides, the President of the Republic of Cyprus, has requested assistance from Jordan to put out the fire.

He was in the country at the time to for a state visit with the King of Jordan.

Euro News reported that the King has ordered additional aircraft to assist Cyprus, while two aircraft from Greece are also expected to join the efforts.

Amid the heatwave, Cyprus is already experiencing a significant lack of rainfall.

The meteorological department told local media this week that 2024 has so far been the tenth driest year on record, going back 123 years.

In Greece, meanwhile, officials have been forced to close the Athens Acropolis – the country’s most visited tourist site – to the public during the hottest hours of Wednesday as the heatwave beats down on the country.

The ministry said the UNESCO-listed archaeological site which sits atop a hill in the centre of the sprawling city would close from midday to 5.00pm local time.

Temperatures are expected to reach 43 degrees Celsius (109 degrees Fahrenheit) on Wednesday and Thursday.

The first heatwave of the year in Greece, regularly hit by searing summer temperatures, is due to peak over those two days, and the ministry said the measure could be extended over safety fears for those making the climb.

The climate crisis and civil protection ministry has warned of a very high risk of fires in the Attica region that surrounds Athens.

Schools will remain closed in several regions of the country on Wednesday and Thursday, including in the capital, while the work ministry has advised public sector employees to work from home.

The Acropolis was also forced to close in July last year during a two-week heatwave unprecedented in its duration.

A record number of almost four million visitors flocked to the site last year, with its popularity boosted in part due to tourists arriving on cruise ships calling in at the port of Piraeus near Athens.

Like Cyprus, France has also been hit by wildfires this week.

Firefighters were mobilised in the town of Vidauban, found 15 miles north of Saint-Tropez, to battle a blaze that has so far burned around 1,500 acres.

Although reports said the fire had been ‘stabilised’, officials warned that it was still active. Nearly 600 firefighters were still working at the scene, they said.

There are concerns that wind could fan the flames, causing it to be spread further.

Firefighters said they were surprised by the power of the fire at this time of year.

Lieutenant Colonel Michel Persoglio of the Var firefighters told France Bleu: ‘We were very surprised yesterday at the turn of the events.

‘A fire is always possible, but in this power, it’s a bit surprising. We had a fire that we usually have in the middle of summer in the middle of the season.’

The unexpected fire has caused issues for the local departments, he added.

‘People are off duty, the planes are at the end of maintenance, so it was more complicated to bring together personnel and equipment,’ he said. ‘We had an implementation time which was a little longer than in the summer.’ 

Wildfires across Europe have become a growing concern in recent years.

In 2022, swathes of France, Spain and Portugal were devastated by major fires, as were Czechia, Germany, Greece, and Slovenia – to name but a few.

According to the European Commission, 20 EU Member States recorded more burned areas than average in 2022, with a total of 837,212 hectares being burned by wildfires that year in Europe.

The 2023 wildfire season was also destructive, with more than half a million hectares (an area twice the size of Luxembourg) being scorched by wildfires.

In stark contrast to the weather conditions in the eastern Mediterranean, Spain – on the sea’s western end – has been hit by storms and torrential downpours that have sparked flash flooding.

On the Balearic island of Majorca, Palma Airport was brought to a standstill on Tuesday by a massive rain storm that flooded the island – with yet more rain expected for Wednesday.

Airport officials said on Tuesday evening that 100 of the ‘more than 900 flights’ scheduled to operate at Palma airport yesterday, including many from British travel hubs like Gatwick, Luton and Bristol, had been affected by the storm.

And images from inside Palma Airport revealed the extent of the chaos inside.

One video showed rainwater flooding one of the airport’s runways, with a member of staff jokingly diving into the water to show how deep it was, while another showed the ceiling above the duty free shops in the airport severely leaking water.

The severe weather hampered a holiday of Race Across the World winner Alfie Watts, who took to his Instagram to complain about the situation.

He said on his Instagram Story: ‘Flew from Luton to Palma, only for the airport to be flooded (and the terminal too) Diverted to Mahon to wait, turns out we almost certainly won’t be heading onwards and will in fact [be] rediverting to… Luton!

‘What an incredible [sic] fun day in the world of WizzAir UK,’ he added.

Much of the Balearics and the Levante area, popular tourist regions that sit on the east of Spain, have been hit by the torrential rain that has wrought devastation.

Images from Costa Blanca showed submerged streets, overflowing rivers, and fast-moving water barrelling across dry fields before crashing onto highways.

Hail stones have fallen in some parts of the Valencian community, which includes the provinces of Alicante and Valencia, with more predicted today, while Benidorm is on a yellow storm alert with the possibility of rain put at 100 per cent.

Further south in Murcia roads have been turned into raging torrents. In its capital city locals and tourists were pictured ankle-deep in water in its main street as they tried to negotiate their way past shops while others took refuge inside.

Elsewhere in the province cars were seen and wheelie bins were seen ‘swimming’ down streets which looked more like rivers. Firefighters were said to be ‘working tirelessly’ with roads closed in some places.

Local media reported that emergency response officials had clocked over 320 incidents relating to the weather as of Monday night.

The region most affected has been Spain’s eastern Levante area, which includes Valencia, Benidorm, Alicante and Murcia – a popular area for British tourists.

Reports said the Valencian Community and the Region of Murcia had been especially impacted. According to the Eltiempo news outlet, over 60 millimetres of rain had fallen around the city of Murcia, leaving vehicles trapped.

Tree branches were also reported to have fallen on tram tracks in Murcia.

One picture showed a car almost completely submerged on a roundabout, and there were reports of people having to be rescued from their vehicles. 

Towns like Yecla, on Murcia’s north-east border with Alicante, are among the places where high temperatures and blue skies have given way to amazing scenes of hailstones and gusting winds in the past few hours.

A Spanish weather website, flagging up large parts of eastern Spain including the Costa Blanca, warned this morning: ‘In the next few hours storms will dump dozens of litres of water and hail on these areas in a very short space of time. Be careful.’

It said: ‘The forecasts proved to be correct and yesterday storms erupted forcefully in parts of the east and centre of the peninsula.

‘In the next few hours intense downpours will gain protagonism in several areas.

The yellow storm and rain alert in place for the Costa Blanca over the next couple of days, as well as the Balearic Islands of Ibiza and Majorca for today only, is not set to be lifted until Thursday.

Bad sea conditions on the Costa Blanca ahead of this week’s flooding were blamed for a string of drownings in the province of Alicante last week and over the weekend.

One of the victims was a 52-year-old British holidaymaker who died on Friday after going to the aid of two children in the water at La Roqueta beach just north of Torrevieja. A 46-year-old Polish man who also tried to help them drowned too.

By contrast British holidaymakers on the Costa del Sol were today basking in glorious sunshine.

In Marbella, where today is a local Bank Holiday coinciding with the resort’s annual feria festival, tourists were topping up their tans under blue skies in 26 degrees C.

It made a welcome break for those who had just flown in from the UK.

Office worker Sally Jones, 26, said: ‘I was in desperate need of sunshine. The weather’s been really gloomy back home.

‘I’ve got friends who are on the Costa Blanca right now and are saying they wished they’d come on holiday with me instead.’

Spain is not the first Mediterranean country to have been hit with extreme flooding this year, after Italy was also struck by flash floods at the end of May.

In one heartbreaking incident, three friends were caught in a flash flood and swept away – after sharing a final embrace.

Tragic footage posted on X showed Patrizia Cormos, 20, her friend Bianca Doros, 23, and her boyfriend Cristian Molnar, 25, standing thigh deep in a churning river.

The chief of the provincial firefighters in Udinehe, Giorgio Basile, told The Telegraph he threw them a rope in a desperate attempt to rescue the group.

But tragically they were ‘swallowed up by the flood waters’ as he watched and he saw them ‘disappear’ on May 31.

Two bodies, believed to be Ms Cormos and Ms Doros, were discovered 1km from the spot they were last seen. The search is still continuing for Mr Molnar, with the fire service vowing: ‘We won’t stop until we find the third missing person.’

It was reported on Saturday that the lawyer for the family of Molnar had slammed the emergency services, saying if they had responded when the first emergency call had been put in, the trio could still be alive.

Meanwhile, Brits have been told they will have to wait until July for warmer weather because of cold winds blowing in from the Arctic.

The UK has been experiencing temperatures three to five degrees below the season average over the past week, the Met Office has said.

This is because a mid-Atlantic jet stream – afast-moving wind in the atmosphere – is guiding wind from the north over the UK resulting in lower temperatures.

However, according to meteorologists, there is no sign of better weather until the end of June.

Met Office meteorologist Simon Partridge said: ‘It looks as if temperatures will stay near or slightly below average for the majority of the rest of June.

‘Over the next couple of nights we’re actually expecting to see a little bit of frost in a few places. This will mainly be across Scotland and possibly into northern England and Northern Ireland where temperatures could get down to around freezing.’

But Mr Partridge clarified that such patterns are ‘not unusual’.

He said: ‘On average we get an air frost – which is when the temperatures reach zero – every two to three Junes. So it’s not that unusual. It’s just not the norm for June to be this cool.’

Towards the weekend, low pressure will lead to even worse weather in parts of northern England.

Mr Partridge said: ‘There will be an area of low pressure sat over the northern part of the UK, which will unfortunately bring more unsettled weather to the UK. 

‘From Thursday onwards and through the weekend, we’ll see showers circulating around the UK.

‘However, temperatures will improve because that low pressure will cut off the supply of cold air across the UK, and as a result, we’ll see the source of air coming from the west causing night-time temperatures to pick up a little.

‘In the daytime we’ll still be staying a degree or so below average, but the big difference is it will mean that overnight temperatures will pick up so our nights won’t be as cold.’

Looking ahead to July, Mr Partridge said that there was ‘no strong signal’ of any particular weather pattern.

He said: ‘The models are following the climatological norm, which indicates that temperatures are where they should be or slightly above average.

‘So there is a hint of things turning slightly warmer as we move into the beginning of July, and it does look as if some spells of drier weather will become a bit more likely.’