The continent has become a baked potato. Yes, dear reader, the World Health Organisation has confirmed what your sweat-drenched shirt and that faint smell of melting tarmac already told you: Europe’s heatwave has now claimed 1,300 souls, with Germany boiling over at a record-shattering 41.7 degrees Celsius. That’s degrees, not the number of people trying to sell you ice cream. Though honestly, at this point, a Mr Whippy van might be the only thing that could save us.
Let us pause to mourn, not just the lives lost, but the sheer, staggering incompetence of our leaders who act surprised every single summer when the sun does what it has always done: exist. Oh, but they’ve issued warnings. They’ve opened “cooling centres.” They’ve advised us to drink water. Gosh, why didn’t we think of that? Maybe next they’ll remind us that fire is hot and that falling from a great height is inadvisable.
Germany, that bastion of efficiency, has suddenly discovered that even the most meticulous train schedule cannot withstand a blast furnace. Trains have melted. Literally. The tracks warped like a Salvador Dalí painting. Meanwhile, in France, nuclear power plants are being shut down because the rivers used for cooling are now the temperature of a weak tea. One shudders to think what the Swiss are doing: probably using the heat to accurately measure how quickly a chocolate fondue can turn into a weapon.
This is not a heatwave. This is a preview. A promotional teaser for the climate catastrophe that will soon be playing at a planet near you. The WHO, bless their bureaucratic hearts, have confirmed the 1,300 dead. But let’s be honest: that number is about as reliable as a politician’s promise. The real toll is likely higher, hidden in villages where old people die quietly in stone cottages that have become pizza ovens. Or in hospitals overwhelmed with heatstroke cases, where nurses are using ice cubes more precious than emergency room staff.
What will it take for action? Another 1,300? Another 13,000? Perhaps when the Thames starts to boil and the gherkin building becomes a literal gherkin, pickling the workers inside, then maybe, just maybe, someone will suggest that we shouldn’t have ignored every single scientific warning for the past 40 years. But no. Instead, we get headlines about “record temperatures” like they’re a prize. Congratulations, Germany! You’ve broken your previous record! Here’s your prize: more air conditioning units, which burn more fossil fuels, making next year’s record even more spectacular.
I am sat here, in my sweltering London flat, sweating gin from every pore, and I can only think: this is fine. Everything is fine. We’re all fine. How’s your day going?
