Wales ‘highly likely’ to see its hottest ever day next week

Wales is “highly likely” to see its hottest ever day next week, MeteoGroup has warned.

Its forecasts show large parts of the east of the east of Wales breaking through the 35.5 celsius record set in Hawarden, Flintshire in August 1990.

The BBC’s weather presenter Sue Charles said that Monmouthshire was set for the highest temperatures of all at 38 celsius.

“It looks likely we’ll break [the record] on Monday, as it turns even hotter in the low to mid 30s,” she said.  “That’s a 38 on the map for Monmouthshire.

“It’s coming up from Spain and Portugal. Southerly winds drawing up extreme heat, and that’s heading towards us early next week.”

☀️ Could we see record-breaking temperatures* across Wales early next week?

*Spoiler alert: highly likely… 📈pic.twitter.com/bBm5R3Shr6

— Sue Charles (@Sue_Charles) July 16, 2022

Meteorologists have meanwhile given an 80% chance of the mercury topping the UK’s record temperature of 38.7C set in Cambridge in 2019, with the current heatwave set to peak on Tuesday.

Wales is covered by an amber weather warning, and UK Government ministers are due to hold an emergency Cobra meeting today after a red weather warning for ‘extreme heat’ was declared for England for the first time.

South Wales Fire And Rescue Service has issued a safety warnings, urging people to act responsibly.

They warn people to disposing of barbecues, lit cigarettes and glass bottles responsibly, to not burn any rubbish such as garden waste and use local authority services instead, and that barbecues should not be used on balconies or near sheds, fences, trees, shrubs and garden waste to avoid anything catching alight.

They also urge people who are cooling off in waterways to be aware of cold-water shock.

‘Unprecedented’

Cabinet Office minister Kit Malthouse is to chair a meeting of the Government’s Cobra civil contingencies committee to discuss the escalating heatwave, a Government spokesman said.

It will be the second Cobra meeting Mr Malthouse has led on the issue.

Following the issuing of the Met Office’s first red warning for extreme heat, covering a swathe of England from London to Manchester and York on Monday and Tuesday, its chief executive Penny Endersby said people can find it hard to know what to expect when “climate change has driven such unprecedented severe weather events”.

“Here in the UK we’re used to treating a hot spell as a chance to go and play in the sun,” she added.

“This is not that sort of weather.”

‘Missing in action’

Labour meanwhile criticised Prime Minister Boris Johnson after reports said he had failed to attend Cobra meetings.

Angela Rayner, Labour’s deputy leader, said: “Boris Johnson has gone missing in action again. He’s back to his old tricks of skipping important Cobra meetings.

“Where’s the plan for the delivery of essential services and how people will be kept safe at work, on transport, in schools, hospitals and care homes?

“The public will have no confidence in this zombie Conservative government responding swiftly and decisively to this national emergency as this disgraced Prime Minister prepares to party while Britain boils.”

‘Severe’

Daytime temperatures on Saturday are predicted to be around 27C in London, 26C in Cardiff, 23C in Belfast and 21C in Edinburgh.

On Sunday, it could reach 30C in the capital, 27C in Cardiff, 24C in Belfast and 23C in Edinburgh.

Temperatures are forecast to increase by several more degrees on Tuesday – up to the mid-30s for much of England and Wales.

There is a 50% chance of temperatures reaching 40C somewhere in the UK, likely along the A1 corridor which runs from London to Scotland through counties including Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Yorkshire and the North East, with the Met Office issuing its first ever red warning for extreme heat.

The UK Health Security Agency has increased its heat health warning from level three to level four – a “national emergency”.

Level four is reached “when a heatwave is so severe and/or prolonged that its effects extend outside the health and social care system… At this level, illness and death may occur among the fit and healthy, and not just in high-risk groups,” it said.