Multiple drownings reported as France deals with record-breaking heat, authorities crack down on drinking alcohol in public

A sign outside a pharmacy displays a temperature of 37 degrees Celsius (98.6 degrees Fahrenheit) in Paris, Sunday, June 21, 2026.

PARIS — France gritted its teeth Monday for a week of record-busting temperatures, sweltering under a heat wave that combines daytime highs above 40 C and sleep-robbing sweaty nights.

The national weather service, Meteo France, said that most of the country -- the largest in the European Union and the second most populous -- is entering what it described as a “plateau” of unrelenting heat-wave conditions that isn’t forecast to start easing before Friday.

Human-caused climate change is tied to increasing extreme weather, and UN climate agency projections say the next five years should shatter more heat records.

Multiple towns in western and central France, including the major Atlantic port of Saint-Nazaire, experienced their hottest night ever Sunday to Monday, with an overnight low of 23.2 C, Meteo France said.

Paris baked through its hottest night for June, not getting below 24.2 C -- a half-degree hotter than the previous record from 2017.

The weather service warned of even hotter nights: “This will continue through the end of the week, with heat levels never before recorded across more than three-quarters of the country on Wednesday and Thursday.”

The heat wave also worsened air quality in the French capital as it causes the formation of ozone that traps pollution. The air quality monitoring agency in the Paris region said pollutants were likely to exceed the recommended threshold.

In a country without widespread air-conditioning, people, businesses and services tried to adapt. Hundreds of schools were closed on Monday and many hundreds more canceled some classes, the education minister said.

Broadcasts on the Paris transport network urged commuters to hydrate. Medical specialists took to the airwaves to warn of the potentially deadly cocktail of drinking alcohol in extreme heat. Authorities cracked down on alcohol consumption in public.

Multiple drownings were reported as people sought relief in rivers, despite warnings about currents and other dangers.

A growing swath of France, spreading on Monday to more than half its regions, was under a “red alert” for heat, with larger areas forecast to suffer highs past 40 C and nights not dropping below 20 C.

In the United Kingdom, the weather office issued a rare “red” weather warning for Wednesday and Thursday. It said temperatures could exceed 37 C in the shade, and could rise to 40 C, in parts of England and Wales.

The Met Office said that as well as a risk to health, extreme temperatures could cause heat-sensitive equipment to fail, including power and mobile phone services.

Over the last four years, more than 200,000 people across Europe died from heat-related causes, and most of those were preventable, the World Health Organization’s Europe office said this month. The above-average temperatures can cause heat exhaustion and life-threatening heat stroke.

Europe is the world’s fastest-warming continent, with temperatures increasing at twice the speed as the global average since the 1980s, according to the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.

The EU monitoring agency found that in Europe and globally, 2024 was the hottest year on record and the continent experienced its second-highest number of “heat stress” days.

Scientists warn that climate change is exacerbating the frequency and intensity of heat and dryness, especially in southeastern Europe, making the region more vulnerable to health impacts and wildfires.

The burning of gasoline, oil and coal, plus deforestation, wildfires and many kinds of factories, release heat-trapping gasses that cause climate change.

John Leicester, The Associated Press