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WEATHER

Southern Italy sizzles in temperatures up to 45C as heatwave continues

The heatwave is set to ‘peak’ in southern Italian regions on Thursday and Friday, with temperatures remaining around 40C (104F) in many areas.

Southern Italy sizzles in temperatures up to 45C as heatwave continues
The place to be this week if you're in southern Italy. Photo: Oliver Moran/AFP

While the whole country is feeling the heat this week, the south is in for more sizzling temperatures throughout the weekend while things should cool down slightly sooner in the north.

The country has been “divided in two” as hot and cool air currents meet over southern Europe, weather forecasters say.

READ ALSO: How to keep cool like an Ancient Roman in Italy’s summer heat

The hottest regions are Sicily, Calabria and Puglia, where the early summer heatwave is expected to reach its ‘peak’ on Thursday on Friday.

Authorities in Sicily have already reported highs of 44.5C in some inland areas on Wednesday.

High humidity and dusty skies have created stifling conditions across the southern regions as warm currents of air moved in this week from North Africa.

“The cold air mass over Western Europe meets very hot currents over the central Mediterranean, caused by the subtropical anticyclone, which also brings with it the desert dust which is enveloping our peninsula,” meteorologist Giulio Betti told Italian newspaper La Repubblica on Thursday.

READ ALSO: ‘Four to five light meals a day’: Italy’s official advice during a heatwave

Adding to the hot and sticky atmosphere is the so-called ‘Afa‘, or hot-humid air.

Temperatures are less extreme in the north of Italy this week, though thunderstorms are expected in some areas, particularly around the Alps, later on Thursday.

From Saturday, temperatures are expected to drop slightly in the north and centre of Italy, before also falling in the south from Sunday.

In many southern areas, temperatures are set to remain in the low-to-mid 30s in the early part of next week before climbing to 40C again.

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WEATHER

Denmark records deepest snow level for 13 years

Blizzards in Denmark this week have resulted in the greatest depth of snow measured in the country for 13 years.

Denmark records deepest snow level for 13 years

A half-metre of snow, measured at Hald near East Jutland town Randers, is the deepest to have occurred in Denmark since January 2011, national meteorological agency DMI said.

The measurement was taken by the weather agency at 8am on Thursday.

Around 20-30 centimetres of snow was on the ground across most of northern and eastern Jutland by Thursday, as blizzards peaked resulting in significant disruptions to traffic and transport.

A much greater volume of snow fell in 2011, however, when over 100 centimetres fell on Baltic Sea island Bornholm during a post-Christmas blizzard, which saw as much as 135 centimetres on Bornholm at the end of December 2010.

READ ALSO: Denmark’s January storms could be fourth extreme weather event in three months

With snowfall at its heaviest for over a decade, Wednesday saw a new rainfall record. The 59 millimetres which fell at Svendborg on the island of Funen was the most for a January day in Denmark since 1886. Some 9 weather stations across Funen and Bornholm measured over 50cm of rain.

DMI said that the severe weather now looks to have peaked.

“We do not expect any more weather records to be set in the next 24 hours. But we are looking at some very cold upcoming days,” DMI meteorologist and press spokesperson Herdis Damberg told news wire Ritzau.

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