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Monday, August 11, 2003
Europe wilts, fires spread as Pope prays for relief from heat wave (10 am)
By Susan Stumme
PARIS -- Pope John Paul II on Sunday prayed for much-needed rain and relief from the punishing heat wave that has smothered large parts of the continent for two weeks, as temperatures in Britain shattered an all-time record.
"I invite you to join my prayer for the victims of this calamity and I urge you to fervently pray to the Lord to give the parched earth a bit of cool rain," the pontiff said in a mass at his summer residence in Castelgandolfo south of Rome.
But there was little relief in sight as new wildfires broke out late Sunday in Portugal and Spain, forcing nearly 1,000 residents to flee their homes. The fires and the heat have killed more than 40 people across the continent.
Temperatures in large parts of Europe have climbed well above 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit), with all-time records tumbling in Germany and Britain. Meteorologists have predicted the temperatures would remain far above normal through at least the end of this week.
In Gravesend in southern England, the thermometer rose to 38.1 degrees Celsius (100.6 Fahrenheit), crashing through the century mark for the first time in recorded history -- the third time Britain's record was broken in the same day.
The previous record of 37.1 degrees Celsius set in 1990 was first shattered at Heathrow airport early in the afternoon, with 37.4 Celsius, before later going up there to 37.9 Celsius, or 100.2 Fahrenheit.
Wildfires flared again in southern Portugal, as strong and shifting winds whipped up a blaze in the Algarve resort province forcing the evacuation of several hundred people, with firefighters struggling to stop the advance of unpredictable blaze.
"The fire is moving quickly and it is burning with intensity," the director of the National Rescue Operation Centre, Gil Martins, told a news conference.
Some 170 firefighters equipped with more than 50 vehicles and water-dropping aircraft were fighting the blaze some 250 kilometers (150 miles) south of Lisbon, he said.
"There are houses burning in the area, people are in a panic," the town priest told the Lusa news agency.
More than 500 people were evacuated from the Comabella and Granera areas in Spain's northeastern Catalonia region as a security measure while the fire, which has already destroyed 750 hectares (1,900 acres), raged on.
With tourists flocking to museums and frolicking in fountains to cool off, forecasters said relief was not on the cards -- France's national weather service Meteo France predicted the stifling heat would continue through Friday.
The oppressive heat has left 19 people dead in Spain and at least one in France -- a three-year-old girl who died of dehydration in her family's car, parked at their home near the Channel port of Boulogne-sur-Mer.
The forest fires in Croatia, France, Italy, Portugal and Spain have ravaged more than 200,000 hectares (500,000 acres) of pinewood and brush in the past two weeks, most of it in Portugal.
Authorities in Lisbon estimated the rash of blazes, which they said Sunday were still burning but under control, had caused damage totaling at least 925 million euros (US$1.05 billion).
Having come under increasing criticism over its handling of the fires, the center-right government of Prime Minister Jose Manuel Durao Barroso decided to order an official inquiry.
Authorities maintaining the Dutch national grid on Sunday issued their first so-called code red for a possible power shortage in almost a decade.
The heat wave has been caused by an anticyclone, which has anchored itself firmly over the west European land mass, holding off rain-bearing depressions over the Atlantic and funneling hot air north from Africa.
The hot, dry weather has plagued Europe's farmers: producers in the German state of Brandenburg said the heat could destroy up to 80 percent of their crops, while in France, about one million chickens died last week.
It also risked interrupting traffic on the Danube, one of Europe's longest waterways. Port authorities in Romania said two ships that sank during World War II but resurfaced due to low water levels could block river traffic.
But not everyone was singing the summer blues: pub and bar owners in Britain were rejoicing, as an estimated three million extra pints of beer were expected to be consumed over the weekend. AFP
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