Italy’s Sicily has recorded the highest temperature in European history as a heatwave sweeps the country.
Early reports suggest that Sicily broke the previous European record of 48C (118.4F) set in Athens in 1977.
The finding comes amid a fierce heatwave stretching across the Mediterranean to Tunisia and Algeria.
Fires have blazed across much of the region for more than a week.
Thus, Italy’s government has declared a state of emergency.
Trevor Mitchell, a meteorologist from the UK Metdesk, said: “The Società Meteorologica Italiana say that the temperature report of 48.8C is genuine.
“However, with potential records such as these, there is typically a process of verification before they can declare officially.”
Italy’s national fire service has reported more than 800 flare-ups last weekend.
Will climate change finally be taken seriously?
Many parts of the world have been on fire in the past few weeks, while experts have connected it to climate change?
Heatwaves, deadly floods and wildfires, this summer people confronted the link between extreme weather and climate change.
A UN-appointed panel of experts recently sounded a dire warning over climate change.
The UN climate panel said that the earth is getting so hot that in about a decade temperatures will probably rise past the most ambitious threshold set in the Paris accord.
With unprecedented fires tearing through Europe and North Africa, so some scientists
believe the reported 48.8 degrees celsius in Sicily could be the highest temperature in European history.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres described the report as a ‘code red’ for humanity.
World leaders to tackle the crisis at the COP26 Climate Change Conference in Glasgow in November.
