Summary
That’s all for today, thanks for following along. Here’s a summary of the day as a heatwave spreads across north Africa and southern Europe, and efforts to contain wildfires across Greece continued for a seventh straight day.
Firefighters in Greece were struggling to contain 82 wildfires across the country, 64 of which started on Sunday, the hottest day of the summer so far. As well as huge blazes on the island of Rhodes, which forced 19,000 people to flee, wildfires also broke out on the island of Corfu and in the northern Peloponnese region, triggering further evacuations.
Greece’s prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, told parliament: “For the next few weeks we must be on constant alert. We are at war, we will rebuild what we lost, we will compensate those who were hurt.”
“The climate crisis is already here, it will manifest itself everywhere in the Mediterranean with greater disasters,” he said.
Wildfires killed 25 people in the mountainous Béjaïa and Bouïra regions of Algeria on Monday, the interior ministry said, as a heatwave spreads across north Africa and southern Europe.
Authorities evacuated nearly 2,500 people from the Greek island of Corfu on Monday as the prime minister warned the heat-hit country was “at war” with several wildfires.
While wildfires raged on the Greek islands Rhodes and Corfu, with thousands of British tourists thought to be there, the UK government continued to refuse to advise against travel to the country.
Ireland’s deputy prime minister has said that a refund would be the “proper approach” for those who want to cancel their holidays in Greek regions affected by wildfires.
The Liberal Democrats are calling on the Foreign Office to add Rhodes to to its “red list” – and advise British nationals against all but essential travel.
The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, has contacted the Greek prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, to offer additional assistance.
The Foreign Office minister Andrew Mitchell told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme the situation on Rhodes was “undoubtedly a wakeup call” on the climate crisis. “Climate change is real. It is now. And it is essential that the world combats it, and Britain is playing a leading role in doing that,” he said.
Rishi Sunak has signalled the UK government could delay or even abandon green policies that impose a direct cost on consumers, as he comes under pressure from the Conservative right to create a dividing line with Labour at the next election.
Tourists planning trips to the Mediterranean should see the Greek wildfires as a “big, big warning”, with the climate crisis highly likely to fuel more severe blazes in future, one of the UK’s leading climate scientists said.
Up to 10,000 Britons are estimated to be on fire-ravaged Rhodes, with repatriation flights to rescue holidaymakers landing back in the UK. Three repatriation flights to return hundreds of holidaymakers from Rhodes are planned on Monday evening, Jet2 said.
An easyJet spokesperson said the airline was doing all it could to help customers in Rhodes and invited those due to travel to or from the island until Saturday to change the date for free.
Jet2, which has cancelled all flights and holidays due to depart to Rhodes up to and including Sunday, has “significantly increased” the number of its staff on the island.
A Tui spokesperson said all outbound flights to Rhodes up to and including Tuesday had been cancelled and passengers due to travel on these flights would receive full refunds.
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Emergency teams in Canada are still searching for four people who went missing in flooding after more than 200mm (7.87in) of rain fell in some parts of Nova Scotia at the weekend.
Two children, a young person and a man were inside two vehicles when the road they were travelling on suddenly became submerged, according to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Nova Scotia.
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The Dutch foreign affairs ministry has warned of travel risks for the Greek islands of Rhodes, Corfu and Evia, moving the advisory colour code to yellow from green because of wildfires.
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25 people killed in forest fires in Algeria on Monday
Twenty-five people including 10 soldiers have been killed in forest fires in in the mountainous regions of Béjaïa and Bouïra, Algerian authorities have said, as a heatwave spreads across north Africa and southern Europe.
About 7,500 firefighters were trying to bring the flames under control, authorities said. The interior ministry said it was continuing its firefighting operations in the Boumerdès, Bouïra, Tizi Ouzou, Jijel, Béjaïa and Skikda regions, Reuters reports.
About 1,500 people have been evacuated so far.
A major heatwave is sweeping across north Africa, with temperatures of 49C (120F) recorded in some cities in neighbouring Tunisia.
In Tunisia, wildfires swept through the border town of Melloula. Witnesses told Reuters that fires that had begun in mountainous areas had reached some people’s homes in the town and forced hundreds of families to flee.
A civil protection official said hundreds of people had been evacuated from the town by land, and and by sea in fishing and coastguard vessels.
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Fires appear to be raging out of control on the Greek island of Evia, with officials speaking of a “nightmarish situation” in the wooded villages above the coastal town of Karystos.
Near-gale winds were propelling flames into inhabited areas, the Evia’s vice-prefect, Giorgos Kelaiditis, told the state news agency in the last hour. “The situation is nightmarish for the villages of Platanistos and Potami because the fire has got into courtyards, it has burned livestock pens, and strong winds continue to push flames into residential areas.”
Media reported a livestock farmer missing.
Famous for its honey and Greece’s third largest Isle, Evia was the scene of some of the worst forest fires in living memory in 2021. Evacuation orders had been issued ahead if the flames barrelling towards residential areas.
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A couple from Norwich were forced to evacuate from a wedding party at which they were guests by the wildfires in Rhodes on Saturday.
Dominic Doggett, 30, and his fiancee Hannah Dolman, 28, had to stay on the floor of an office in a hotel after the wedding do came to an “abrupt end”.
After arriving at Gatwick airport, Doggett told PA Media: “Mid-afternoon at the wedding, we got a notification that said some areas were being evacuated.
“With it being a wedding, we tried to keep the bride and groom unaware and stay as happy as possible.
“Later in the evening… we got a further notification on our phones from the alert system to say our area was also being evacuated.
“The music cut and the lights came on and the staff said we needed to leave. The wedding was due to finish at 2am but it finished three hours early.”
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Irish foreign affairs department 'increasing capacity' to help citizens affected by fires, says deputy prime minister
Ireland’s deputy prime minister has said that a refund would be the “proper approach” for those who want to cancel their holidays in Greek regions affected by wildfires.
The tánaiste and minister for foreign affairs, Micheál Martin, said Irish embassies and his department had received a number of queries from citizens, and advised them to listen to the Greek authorities’ advice.
He said the department is “increasing capacity” to reach Irish citizens affected by wildfires in Greece.
Nearly 20,000 people, many of them tourists, are being evacuated from the island of Rhodes as large fires swept down from the mountains towards the south-western coastal resort towns. Warnings of similar wildfire threats in Corfu and Evia have also been issued.
Climate experts have warned that extreme temperatures in the Mediterranean are more likely in the coming years due to greenhouse gases emitted by human activity heating the Earth’s atmosphere.
Asked about the issue at the Curragh Camp in County Kildare on Monday, Martin advised Irish citizens to take advice from the Greek authorities.
“We would say to people in the area, as we have been doing in the Department of Foreign Affairs, to contact your tour operator,” he said.
“Take all advice from the authorities. Evacuate when you’re asked to evacuate and don’t hesitate.
“We have received queries from a number of Irish nationals on the island and we’re increasing our capacity to the region in terms of helping Irish citizens who are in challenging circumstances or in difficulties, and liaising with the authorities to facilitate Irish citizens.”
He said this included logistics and emergency passports where originals had been left in hotels during evacuations.
Asked whether people should be compensated for choosing not to travel to regions due to wildfires, Martin said a “refund would be the proper approach there”.
“I think safety first, and we need to work with all stakeholders to make sure we prioritise taking decisions on the basis of safety and protection of human life,” he said.
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Authorities evacuated nearly 2,500 people from the Greek island of Corfu on Monday as the prime minister warned that the heat-battered country was “at war” with several wildfires.
Tens of thousands of people have already fled blazes on the island of Rhodes, with many frightened tourists scrambling to get home on evacuation flights, AFP reports.
About 2,400 visitors and locals were evacuated from the Ionian island of Corfu from Sunday through until Monday, a fire service spokesperson said, adding that the departures were a precaution.
“We are at war and are exclusively geared towards the fire front,” the Greek prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, told the parliament in Athens, warning that the nation faced “another three difficult days ahead” before high temperatures are forecast to ease.
Greece has been sweltering under a lengthy spell of extreme heat that has increased wildfire risk and left visitors stranded in the peak tourist season.
Because of the wildfires, an annual celebration on Monday to mark the 1974 restoration of democracy in Greece was cancelled.
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Firefighters in Greece were struggling to contain 82 wildfires across the country, 64 of which started on Sunday, the hottest day of the summer so far.
As well as huge blazes on the island of Rhodes, which forced 19,000 people to flee, wildfires also broke out on the island of Corfu and in the northern Peloponnese region, triggering further evacuations.
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Guardian Australia asked seven leading climate scientists to describe how they felt as much of the northern hemisphere is engulfed by blistering heatwaves, and a number of global land and ocean climate records are broken.
‘I am stunned by the ferocity’
What is playing out all over the world right now is entirely consistent with what scientists expect. No one wants to be right about this. But if I’m honest, I am stunned by the ferocity of the impacts we are currently experiencing. I am really dreading the devastation I know this El Niño will bring. As the situation deteriorates, it makes me wonder how I can be most helpful at a time like this. Do I keep trying to pursue my research career or devote even more of my time to warning the public? The pressure and anxiety of working through an escalating crisis is taking its toll on many of us.
- Dr Joëlle Gergis, senior lecturer in climate science Fenner School of Environment and Society, associate investigator ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate Extremes at the Australian National University
‘Even 1.2C of global warming isn’t safe’
We knew by the mid-1990s that lurking in the tails of our climate model projections were monsters: monstrous heatwaves, catastrophic extreme rainfall and floods, subcontinental-scale wildfires, rapid ice sheet collapse raising sea level metres within a century. We knew – just like we know gravity – that Australia’s Great Barrier Reef could be one of the earliest victims of uncontained global warming.
But as today’s monstrous, deadly heatwaves overtake large parts of Asia, Europe and North America with temperatures the likes of which we have never experienced, we find even 1.2C of global warming isn’t safe.
- Bill Hare, physicist and climate scientist and chief executive of Climate Analytics
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A British court has dismissed a lawsuit that accuses Shell’s leadership of mismanaging climate risks to the oil firm, but the activist investor group that brought it plans to appeal.
Corporations have faced a growing number of climate-related lawsuits in recent years as they come under pressure to step up efforts to curb global warming.
Shell was already ordered by a Dutch court in 2021 to slash its greenhouse gas emissions by 45% by the end of the decade after it was sued by environmental groups.
This time, ClientEarth, an environmental law NGO and a minor Shell shareholder, filed in February a lawsuit in the high court of England and Wales against Shell bosses “for failing to manage the material and foreseeable risks posed to the company by climate change”, AFP reports.
But the judges dismissed the case, once in May and and again on Monday after a hearing earlier in July. ClientEarth said it was disappointed by the dismissal and plans to appeal.
A Shell spokesperson said the dismissal was “the right outcome”, adding that the court had reaffirmed its decision that the claim was “fundamentally flawed”.
The company said ClientEarth’s claim “entirely” ignored “how directors of a business as large and complex as Shell must balance a range of competing considerations”.
At its annual shareholders meeting in May, Shell’s management received majority backing even though there were disruptions and doubts expressed about its climate transition.
The company later announced a change of plans: instead of gradually reducing oil output it would hold it steady until 2030.
ClientEarth’s senior lawyer Paul Benson said in statement: “The board’s strategy to manage the risks of the energy transition was fundamentally flawed as it was. Now the board seems to be dropping even any pretence that it will take meaningful action.”
Shell said on Monday that decision reflected the fact it had already met its 2030 goal of reducing oil production by 26% from the 2019 level.
ClientEarth says Shell’s flawed climate strategy is inconsistent with the 2015 Paris agreement and jeopardises the company’s future commercial success, and thus constitutes a breach of its legal duties under English company law.
Benson said: “The board’s refusal to take decisive action to prepare the company for the fast-advancing energy transition puts Shell’s future commercial viability at risk.”
According to ClientEarth, this is the first time a company board has been targeted by a lawsuit for failing to properly handle the climate transition.
Shell’s first-quarter net profit surged 22% to $8.7bn (£6.8bn) but has indicated its second quarter performance has been hit by a drop in gas sales.
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Rishi Sunak has signalled the UK government could delay or even abandon green policies that impose a direct cost on consumers, as he comes under pressure from the Conservative right to create a dividing line with Labour at the next election.
The prime minister said the drive to reach the UK’s net zero targets should not “unnecessarily give people more hassle and more costs in their lives”, as he rethought his green agenda after the Tories won last week’s Uxbridge and Ruislip byelection.
His official spokesperson confirmed the government would “continually examine and scrutinise” measures including phasing out gas boilers by 2035, energy efficiency targets for private rented homes and low traffic neighbourhoods.
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Here are the latest images coming across the wires from the Greek island of Rhodes:
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A Swedish court has fined the climate activist Greta Thunberg for disobeying police during an environmental protest at an oil facility last month.
Thunberg, 20, admitted to the facts but denied guilt, saying the fight against the fossil fuel industry was a form of self-defence because of the existential and global threat of the climate crisis, AP reports.
“We cannot save the world by playing by the rules,” she told journalists after hearing the verdict, vowing she would “definitely not” back down.
The court rejected her argument and fined her 2,500 kronor (about £190).
Charges were brought against Thunberg and several other youth activists from the Reclaim the Future movement for refusing a police order to disperse after blocking road access to an oil terminal in Malmö on 19 June.
Irma Kjellström, a spokesperson for Reclaim the Future, said: “If the court sees our actions of self-defence as a crime, that’s how it is.”
Kjellström, who was also present at the June protest, added: “[Activists] have to be exactly where the harm is being done.”
The sentencing appeared to have little effect on their determination — just a few hours later, Thunberg and Reclaim the Future activists returned to the oil terminal to stage to another roadblock.
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Adam Walker, 33, a business analyst from Telford, flew to Rhodes on Friday night with his wife, mother-in-law and two young children, for a holiday in the beach resort of Pefkos on the eastern coast of the island.
“We arrived at 2am on Saturday. When we were in the pool that afternoon we could see smoke in the distance, and a red glow on top of the hill. There was ash falling on us during dinner. At midnight on Saturday, we were told by text message to leave our hotel and move to the beach. It was absolute chaos,” he said.
“There was mixed messaging about whether to take bags or not. After about half an hour we were told to walk about half a kilometre to the top of the hill with our bags, but there was no information from anyone about where we were going. Everyone was upset as they were trying to figure out where to send people as it was happening.”
Eventually, Walker said, buses came and took scores of holidaymakers to Rhodes town.
“We were left at a school, where we got our towels and clothes out and lay on tiles. There were power cuts and at times no running water, with toilets overflowing.”
Walker was disappointed to find that there was no direct support and communication from his travel operator during the evacuation. “There were no representatives anywhere. We were helped by local Greek volunteers, lots of students turned up at some point. There wasn’t much sleeping going on,” he said.
Walker added that his family had no idea there were fires raging in the area before they set off from the UK: “We hadn’t seen it at all on the news. It all kicked off properly the day we landed.”
The family spent all day at the school and were told on Sunday evening that they would be able to board a plane back to the UK free of charge.
“At some point on Sunday, people were told they could go back to the resort [by the travel operator], which some people did before being evacuated again,” Walker said.
“We didn’t know where the flights were going in the UK, and were asked to put down a preference for where we wanted to go.”
The family arrived back in Birmingham on Monday morning, with some of their belongings still at the Lindia Thalassa hotel in Pefkos. Walker said he was yet to contact the travel company for a refund.
“We didn’t have time to pack everything,” he said. “I know you cannot plan for the fires, and understand this year’s fires are extreme, but they could have had an evacuation plan in place in case something like this happened.
“There’s probably going to be more of these fires in future.”
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A woman celebrating her honeymoon on Rhodes has spoken of her “traumatic” experience after she and her husband were forced to evacuate their hotel on Saturday.
Claire Jones, 36, and her husband, Paul, also 36, were evacuated by coach from the Village Rhodes beach resort near Lardos. They were driven to another beach, where they were placed on three different boats to escape from the wildfires. She told the PA news agency:
It was really quite traumatic driving to where we went because you could see everyone fleeing their hotels, and people were walking along the beaches, walking along the roads, and they had babies and small children.
Before the coaches arrived, Jones recalled:
When we got to the car park and you could see the fires getting closer and closer and closer, and the coaches weren’t turning up [...] that was really worrying. When we first got on the coach, that was the most scary, because I thought ‘if that wind blows towards us, that fire is going to hit this coach’.
Jones added that she and her husband were “very lucky” as they managed to flee to Faliraki in the north of the island, where they had planned to stay later in their trip.
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All Thomas Cook customers who had to leave their accommodation in Rhodes over the weekend are either returning home or staying in another hotel.
The travel firm said about 50 customers were forced to evacuated because of the wildfires that have hit part of the island, PA reports.
In a statement, it went on:
We no longer have any customers in evacuation centres.
We are in touch with customers who arrived on the island yesterday to areas unaffected by the fire and they are enjoying their holiday.
We will continue to monitor the situation and work with our local partners and local authorities to ensure the safety of our customers.
We are extending our policy for offering full and swift refunds to customers who are due to travel to Rhodes up to and including Wednesday 26 July and no longer wish to do so.
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The Liberal Democrats are calling on the Foreign Office to add Rhodes to to its “red list” - and advise British nationals against all but essential travel, the BBC reports.
“Thanks to Conservative ministers’ inaction, many families are unable to make a claim against their insurance – leaving them paying the penalty for deciding not to fly out to the island,” the Lib Dems’ foreign affairs spokesperson said in a statement.
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PA reports on the latest statements from airlines:
An easyJet spokeswoman said the company is doing “all it can” to help customers in Rhodes and invited those due to travel to or from the island until Saturday to change the date for free.
A Tui spokeswoman said the firm’s “main priority” is customers’ safety and its staff are doing “all they can” to help those affected by the fires.
The firm later said: “We appreciate how distressing and difficult it’s been for those who have been evacuated and ask that they continue to follow the advice of the local authorities and keep in touch with the Tui reps who are present in all evacuation centres. Our teams will be contacting customers with any updates as soon as they can.
“We have cancelled all outbound flights to Rhodes up to and including Tuesday, and passengers due to travel on these flights will receive full refunds.
“Passengers due to travel on Wednesday will be offered a fee-free amend to another holiday or the option to cancel for a full refund. We are still operating flights to bring those customers currently on holiday elsewhere in Rhodes home as planned.”
Jet2, which has cancelled all flights and holidays due to depart to Rhodes up to and including Sunday, has “significantly increased” the number of its staff on the island.”
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Greece is often hit by wildfires during the summer months but the climate crisis has led to more extreme heatwaves across southern Europe, raising concerns that tourists will stay away, Reuters reports.
Tourism accounts for 18% of Greece’s GDP and one in five jobs. On Rhodes and many other Greek islands, reliance on tourism is even greater.
Civil Protection said practically every region of Greece was facing the threat of wildfires on Monday ranging from high, very high to state of alert.
Temperatures over the past week have exceeded 40C (104F) in many parts of the country and were forecast to persist in the coming days.
A firefighting helicopter makes a water drop as a wildfire burns near the village of Archangelos, on the island of Rhodes, Greece. Photograph: Nicolas Economou/Reuters
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'Climate crisis will manifest itself everywhere with greater disasters,' says Greek PM
Greece’s prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, has told parliament: “For the next few weeks we must be on constant alert. We are at war, we will rebuild what we lost, we will compensate those who were hurt,” Reuters reports.
He added: “The climate crisis is already here, it will manifest itself everywhere in the Mediterranean with greater disasters.”
Tour operators flew home nearly 1,500 holidaymakers at the start of a mass evacuation from wildfires on the Greek island of Rhodes on Monday, Reuters said. Officials said the threat of further fires was high in almost every region of the country.
Ryanair said its flights to and from Rhodes were operating as normal and it was monitoring the situation on Monday. The airline’s chief executive, Michael O’Leary, said Ryanair had not seen passengers seeking to cancel flights to Rhodes over the weekend, given fires were more in the south of the island and the airport and most resorts in the north.
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Up to 10,000 Britons are estimated to be on fire-ravaged Rhodes, with repatriation flights to rescue holidaymakers landing back in the UK.
PA reported the Foreign Office minister Andrew Mitchell said it was “peak holiday season”, with between 7,000 and 10,000 Britons estimated to be on the island.
He told Times Radio:
What we’re telling people to do is to keep in touch with their tourist company, and that is the right advice.
There were only 10 free beds on the whole island when I asked yesterday. But we think that something like 1,000 beds may well come back on stream today as others don’t now come and therefore more beds are available.”
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In Greece, help has continued to arrive from the rest of the European Union and elsewhere, with Turkish firefighting planes joining the effort in Rhodes, where eight water-dropping planes and 10 helicopters buzzed over flames up to five meters (16 feet) tall despite low visibility, The Associated Press reports.
“The risk of fire will be extreme in several areas of Greece today,” a fire service spokesperson, Vassilis Vathrakogiannis ,said a day after temperatures on the southern Greek mainland hit 45C (113F).
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Wildfires killed 15 people in the mountainous Bejaia and Bouira regions of Algeria on Monday, the interior ministry said, as a heatwave spreads across north Africa and southern Europe, Reuters reports.
About 7,500 firefighters were trying to bring the flames under control, authorities said. Firefighters were also at work in the Boumerdès, Tizi Ouzou, Jijel and Skikda regions. About 1,500 people had been evacuated.
A heatwave has hit north African countries, with temperatures reaching 49C (120F) in some Tunisian cities.
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The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, has contacted the Greek prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, to offer additional assistance.
“I called Mitsotakis to express our full support for Greece, which is confronted with devastating forest fires and a heavy heat wave due to climate change,” she tweeted.
I called @KMitsotakis to express our full support for Greece, which is confronted with devastating forest fires and a heavy heat wave due to climate change.
— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) July 23, 2023
Greece is handling this difficult situation with professionalism, putting emphasis on safely evacuating thousands of… https://t.co/WhQ3udTlX6
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Dr Douglas Kelley, a land surface modeller at the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, said:
It is too early to say if climate change has caused these wildfires. However, the fact there are now so many across the world, most recently in Greece and Canada, is a clear sign that climate change is causing an increase in the number of severe wildfires globally.
Heatwaves such as the one in Greece are more likely under climate change. A heatwave dries out vegetation and dead plant material, which makes the fires more intense and spread much faster, especially with the recent high winds.
While not uncommon in southern Europe, what was unusual about the fires in Rhodes was the intensity and the speed at which they spread. We predict there will be a global increase in these extreme fires of up 50% by the end of the century.
There is a feedback loop where fires in ecosystems that store large amounts of carbon, such as forests, result in the release of vast quantities of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. This exacerbates global warming, which in turn increases the risk of wildfires.
Even if we reduce greenhouse gas emissions, there are likely to be more wildfire events by 2100 because global temperatures are continuing to rise and are expected to reach 1.5 to 2 degrees celsius higher than pre-industrial times. This means that communities in some regions will need to adapt to increases in burning.’’
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Almost 2,500 people evacuated from Corfu, say Greek authorities
Greek authorities say they have evacuated nearly 2,500 people from Corfu on Monday, according to Agence France-Presse (AFP). Earlier, the UK’s Foreign Office minister Andrew Mitchell said no evacuations were taking place on the island on Monday morning.
About 2,400 visitors and locals were evacuated from the Ionian island on Sunday and Monday, a local fire service spokesperson has said, adding that the departures are a precaution.
“We are at war and are exclusively geared towards the fire front,” the Greek prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, told parliament, warning that the country faced “another three difficult days ahead” before high temperatures were forecast to ease.
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No 10 insists declining to advise against travel to Greece is right decision
Downing Street has defended its decision not to discourage Britons from going to Rhodes, saying it does not want to “act out of proportion to the situation on the ground”. The government has sent a small Foreign Office team to help holidaymakers. Now, the prime minister’s official spokesperson has said:
Our advice is focused on the safety of British nationals and enabling people to make an informed decision about the situation on the ground.
The current situation is impacting on a limited area in Rhodes and, whilst it’s right to keep it under review and it’s possible that the advice may change, we do not want to act out of proportion to the situation on the ground.
He said there were “not currently” plans to get the RAF to help people leave.
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Ludovica Gazze, an associate professor of economics at the University of Warwick, says the pollution from the wildfires is likely to have an effect throughout Greece – and beyond.
The economic costs of wildfires are substantial and widespread. There are the immediate and visible costs of healthcare and assistance, as well as forgone tourist income.
There are also the invisible costs of the pollution caused by wildfires, which can travel hundreds of miles as we saw in the case of the Canada wildfires in June. Pollution worsens health, cognition, and productivity.
Thankfully, these fires in Rhodes and Corfu seem more contained, but the costs will be borne by the whole country, and beyond in the case of pollution. The key here is prevention: we need to think about where and how we build homes and hotels.
King agreed with other scientists, who have said that – while many wildfires are started by people, whether on purpose or by accident – rising temperatures and drier conditions exacerbated by the climate crisis mean fires can spread with lethal speed and ferocity.
There’s no coincidence at all that climate change has driven these higher temperatures, and the higher temperatures are causing the fires that are spreading.
The only way to tackle this is deep and rapid emissions reductions. In terms of greenhouse gases, we have virtually doubled the amount of greenhouse gases compared to the pre-industrial level.
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Tourists heading to the Mediterranean should see Greek wildfires as a 'big, big warning', says climate scientist
Tourists planning trips to the Mediterranean should see the Greek wildfires as a “big, big warning”, with the climate crisis highly likely to fuel more severe blazes in future, one of the UK’s leading climate scientists says.
Sir David King, a former UK chief scientific adviser and chair of the Climate Crisis Advisory Group, has said many people will die from heat stress because of the relentless heatwaves over southern Europe, where millions of Britons travel on holiday each year.
Speaking to the PA news agency from another Greek island, King warned tourists to take care in the heat, adding that he had “no doubt” the extreme temperatures were due to melting ice in the Arctic caused by greenhouse gases emitted by people heating the Earth’s atmosphere.
If you are in one of these very warm areas and you haven’t got air conditioning indoors you could suffer terribly – many people will die from heat stress.
You must have moving air – it makes an enormous difference. If there’s a large fan, preferentially a roof fan, that is moving the air in the room ... because moving the air helps to remove the perspiration from your body and keeps you cooler.
I wouldn’t be too dogmatic about advice but, certainly, there’s a big, big warning this summer. To anyone planning to go overseas for the summer, ‘be very careful’ would be my advice.
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Fires have broken out on the island of Corfu after Greek authorities called for the country’s largest wildfire evacuation. At the time of writing, there are 82 wildfires burning across Greece, with evacuations taking place on the north-east side of the island of Corfu.
If you’ve been affected by wildfires on Corfu, or are working to combat them, we would like to hear from you. We are also interested in hearing from people who have changed their travel plans because of the fires.
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Some commentators have pointed to the potential for arson to be a cause of the wildfires as a form of “gotcha” to those warning wildfires are made more likely – and more deadly – by the climate emergency.
Scientists have addressed this. While ignition may not be caused by a warming planet, the area being hotter and drier due to climate breakdown makes the development of a wildfire more likely. Prof Stefan Doerr, the director of the Centre for Wildfire Research, Swansea University, says:
I have not heard about any specific causes of ignition for these fires. The media often focus on these, however, during times of extreme fire weather (very dry vegetation, very high temperatures, low air humidity and strong winds) any ignition can rapidly turn into a fast moving wildfire.
That could be faulty power lines, small intentional fires to burn debris getting out of control, sparks from moving machinery or building activity, arson etc.
Focusing mainly on ignition sources (there will always be some) distracts from the main issues which are more flammable landscapes due to insufficient management of vegetation and more extreme weather due to climate change.
Dr Matthew Jones, from the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, School of Environmental Sciences, UEA, added:
Under climate change, what’s changing is the frequency of the weather conditions that enable fires like this to break out, and also to burn so intensely and synchronously across the Mediterranean.
The Mediterranean has seen a dramatic increase in the frequency of the hot, dry conditions that were considered extreme at the end of the last century, and these increases are expected to accelerate for each added degree of warming in future.
To minimise the additional risk of events like these in future, we – that is, policymakers and wider society – must deliver on the ambition shown in Paris in 2015 to limit warming to no more than 2C.
This is just one more example of how climate change can impact society in negative and costly ways, and why there is so much urgency to do something about it now.
Three repatriation flights to return hundreds of holidaymakers from Rhodes are planned on Monday evening, Jet2 says.
The holiday firm said a flight carrying 95 people landed at Leeds Bradford airport late on Sunday evening. In addition to more than 50 scheduled flights, one flight will depart for Manchester, another for Leeds Bradford and a third for Birmingham later on Monday. A spokesperson has said:
We understand how difficult this experience has been for many, and our entire focus is on looking after our customers. We have a significantly expanded presence in Rhodes, with a huge team of experienced colleagues providing all the support we can for our customers, whether that is in affected areas or at Rhodes airport.
Tourists line up in check-in counters as they wait for departing planes at the airport, after being evacuated following a wildfire on the island of Rhodes, Greece. Photograph: Nicolas Economou/Reuters
We have also put on three repatriation flights to bring our customers home, which is on top of our scheduled programme of flights that will continue to operate from Rhodes to the UK this week. We are continuing to make decisions in the best interests of our customers, and we are keeping everything under constant review.
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Mitchell’s comments about the importance of the climate crisis to the government come as the prime minister Rishi Sunak makes a somewhat more equivocal assessment. He has stressed that he wants to tackle the issue in what he calls a “proportionate and pragmatic” way that does not unnecessarily impact people’s lives.
Asked whether he stands by the ban on selling new petrol and diesel cars from 2030 by broadcasters on a visit to a housing development in Worcestershire, the Sunak insisted:
Of course net-zero is important to me. So yes we’re going to keep making progress towards our net-zero ambitions and we’re also going to strengthen our energy security.
I think the events over the last year or two have demonstrated the importance of investing more in homegrown energy, whether that’s more nuclear or offshore wind. I think that’s what people want to see and that’s what I’m going to deliver.
Asked whether he will stand up to the MPs within his party who are urging against net-zero policies, Sunak said:
Actually, I’m standing up for the British people because I’m also cognisant that we’re living through a time at the moment where inflation is high. That’s having an impact on household and families’ bills. I don’t want to add that, I want to make it easier.
So yes we’re going to make progress towards net-zero but we’re going to do that in a proportionate and pragmatic a way that doesn’t unnecessarily give people more hassle and more costs in their lives – that’s not what I’m interested in and prepared to do.
Wildfires a 'wakeup call' on the climate crisis – government minister
The situation on Rhodes is “undoubtedly a wakeup call” on the climate crisis, Mitchell says. He has told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme:
We had, just a couple of weeks ago, the hottest day, on Monday, that the world has ever experienced. Those temperatures were then exceeded on the Wednesday for a second weekly record.
And then, on Thursday, the third record in one week. The highest temperatures the planet has ever seen. Climate change is real. It is now. And it is essential that the world combats it, and Britain is playing a leading role in doing that.
Mitchell has claimed it is not the moment to “spend too much time” on whether the UK government should have acted sooner in providing support to people on holiday on Rhodes.
Asked about reports that Conservative chairman of the Foreign Affairs committee Alicia Kearns said ministers should have acted sooner, Mitchell has told LBC radio:
I think now probably is not the time to spend too much time on this. The important thing today is to make sure that we do everything we can to support those poor Brits who have been caught up in this. But Alicia is doing her job ... we must always be held to account in a transparent way in government.
He told BBC Breakfast earlier:
We deployed immediately a rapid forward team of six experts from the British Foreign Office, as well as four Red Cross operators as well.
They are based at the airport. As of last night, they’d had 20 people come to them for support, all of whom we have been able to support. But we are monitoring the situation hour by hour.
UK government refuses to advise against travel to Greece
While wildfires rage on the Greek islands Rhodes and Corfu, with thousands of British tourists thought to currently be there, the UK government continues to refuse to advise against travel to the country.
The Foreign Office minister Andrew Mitchell told broadcasters this morning that “only 10%” of Rhodes is affected by the fires, meaning “it is the tourist companies and the holiday experts who are best placed to give guidance on whether or not a family or individuals’ holidays are going to be ruined by these events”.
We’ll be following the news from Greece as it comes in throughout the day.
