BRUSSELS, July 27 (Xinhua) -- Dangerous heatwaves may be a major cause of the wildfires raging across southern Europe in the summer of 2017, study showed.
Since late June, multiple huge fires have broken out.
WILDFIRES IN MANY PLACES
On June 17, a record-setting wildfire broke out in the Portuguese town of Pedrogao Grande, scorching 30,000 hectares (300 square km) of forest and killing more than 60 people. Because of the searing heat and continuously shifting winds, the fire was only doused after firefighters fought it for four days.
On July 11, multiple wildfires have been reported to rage across Italy's southern Sicily region, while the number of blazes in the Italian capital increased almost fourfold from last year, authorities and local media reported.
A fire of unknown cause started on July 16 and ravaged the area near Croatia's Adriatic coast in Dalmatia region, later spread to Croatia's second largest city of Split, due to strong wind. More than 80 people have been injured in the fire, with about 4,500 hectares (45 square km) of forest burned out.
The wildfire nightmare in southern Europe keeps going from bad to worse this week.
Thousands of French firemen on Wednesday are struggling to contain a huge wildfire which still menaces the southeast, notably in the department of Var where 10,000 people have been evacuated, according to local authorities.
WILDFIRES SPARKED BY HEATWAVES
Over recent years, Europe has experienced extreme weather more commonly. Meteorologists attributed the phenomena to climate change.
Monthly temperatures for June and July were set to be about 3 degrees Celsius above long-term averages for parts of Europe, the World Weather Attribution, a collaborative project on climate change, said in a report.
The scorching heat across the European Continent resulting from climate change is presumed to be a major cause of multiple forest fires across southern Europe.
A new research showed that human-made climate change has dramatically increased the likelihood of the extreme heatwave which results in deadly forest fires, according to a report by the Guardian newspaper in late June.
