France is in the midst of a relentless heatwave, with more than half the country experiencing a red heat alert Wednesday.
Tens of thousands of homes in western Brittany lost power, and a major wildfire in Maine‑Loire was brought under control overnight.
The midday high in Paris reached 29 °C, and temperatures are projected to stay above 39 °C across much of the west until the weekend.
Heat‑related drownings have already claimed forty lives; a young girl lost her life after a Seine swim.
Authorities have shortened the Louvre’s closing time from 18:00 to 16:00 in response to the building’s vulnerability to heat.
European forecasters warn that the heatwave will spread to the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Poland, Croatia and Hungary, with maximum temperatures approaching 40 °C.
Climate‑change models say Europe is warming twice as fast as the global average, prompting up‑scaling of heat‑risk measures.
