Heat reaches record highs in Paris, Belgium as Europe sizzles

PARIS: Paris has beaten its all-time heat record, hitting 40.6C (105.1F) amid a heatwave breaking barriers across Europe.

Authorities say the temperature is still rising. The national weather service Meteo France announced that the new record was reached on Thursday afternoon, beating the previous record of 40.4C (104.8F) in 1947.

It is one of several records set in this week’s heatwave, the second wave baking the continent this summer. France saw its hottest-ever day on record last month, when a southern town reached 46C (114.8 F).

Meanwhile, officials in Belgium said the nation has seen temperatures rise past the 40C mark for the first time since records were kept in 1833. The Belgian meteorological institute said on Thursday that the new record now stood at 40.2C (104.4F), recorded close to Liege in eastern Belgium’s Angleur on Wednesday.

It had said earlier that the 39.9C seen in Kleine Brogel was the new national record.

However, there was tragedy in Austria when a two-year-old boy died of dehydration after getting into an overheated parked car at a family farm in the Styria region.

The German weather service also announced a new record temperature of 41.5C (106.7F), breaching the previous high set earlier in the day.

The meteorological service said temperatures had risen Thursday to a new national high in the northern German town of Lingen and that they were expected to climb even higher in the late afternoon.