Extreme ‘heat dome’ hitting Olympics ‘impossible’ without global heating
Scorching temperatures in Mediterranean countries and north Africa already causing increase in premature deaths

Damian Carrington Environment editor
Wed 31 Jul 2024 09.00 EDT

The “heat dome” causing scorching temperatures across western Europe and north Africa, and boiling athletes and spectators at the Olympic Games in Paris, would have been impossible without human-caused global heating, a rapid analysis has found.

Scientists said the fossil-fuelled climate crisis made temperatures 2.5C to 3.3C hotter. Such an event would not have happened in the world before global heating but is now expected about once a decade, they said. Continued emissions of heat-trapping carbon dioxide will make them even more frequent, the researchers warned.

“Climate change crashed the Olympics on Tuesday,” said Dr Friederike Otto, a climatologist at Imperial College London and part of the World Weather Attribution group behind the analysis. “The world watched athletes swelter in 35C heat. If the atmosphere wasn’t overloaded with emissions from burning fossil fuels, Paris would have been about 3C cooler and much safer for sport.”

Numerous athletes, including the gymnastics superstar Simone Biles, have suffered in the heat, with one tennis player having called it “crazy” and sailing competitors having worn ice vests to keep cool. Fans watching the beach volleyball near the Eiffel Tower were sprayed with hoses, while misting fountains have been set up at skateboarding and other venues and millions of bottles of water have been handed out at train and Métro stations.

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