According to meteorologist Reinout van den Born of Weer.nl, the heatwave is caused by warm air flowing into the Mediterranean Sea from the Sahara. “It starts in Spain and Portugal and then continues in the south of Italy, and finally also in Croatia, Serbia, Greece and Turkey.”
According to Van den Born, what makes the Cerberus heatwave particularly special is that it lasts so long. “There was a time when 40 degrees in the Mediterranean was something very special and made headlines, but now it’s the order of the day.”
Harmful to health
Temperatures around 49 degrees, expected in Sicily in the coming days, are exceptional in Europe. And that’s good, because such extreme temperatures are definitely a health risk for the elderly. ‘You can’t actually cool off, because the temperature around you is hotter than your own body temperature. A study was released last week showing that 62,000 people died prematurely in the heat last year.’
For example, climate change is slowly making some areas uninhabitable in the summer. “This may not yet apply to us in Europe, although it may already be talked about in the Mediterranean, but it is in India, parts of Africa, Central America and the southern United States,” says Van den Born.