Melting Glaciers Create Waterfalls... Europe Faces 'Disaster-Level' Heatwave

[Anchor]

Europe's heatwave has also escalated into a climate disaster. Record-breaking temperatures exceeding 40 degrees Celsius are being recorded across various regions, with melting glaciers turning into waterfalls and severe droughts raising concerns over food shortages.

Reporting from Paris, here is Kwon Yeongin.

[Reporter]

This is the Pasterze Glacier in Austria, the largest glacier in the eastern Alps.

The killer heatwave has caused the glacier to melt, forming a massive waterfall.

[Markus Lacunar / Austrian National Park Ranger (translated): It is 30 degrees here. This is by no means typical weather for a mountainous region. The glacier here has no choice but to melt even faster.]

In Austria, the capital of Vienna hit 41°C (106°F), and the eastern region reached 41.2°C (106°F), repeatedly breaking record highs day after day.

Slovakia also saw temperatures soar to a record 41.4°C (107°F), and Italy issued the highest heatwave alerts for all 27 cities registered in its heatwave monitoring system for the first time in history.

Droughts coupled with the heatwave are also severe.

Water levels in the Danube River, which flows across Europe, are breaking historic lows day after day.

Hungary, which has used Danube river water as cooling water for its nuclear power plants, has halted operations at three of the four units at the Paks Nuclear Power Plant—which supplies more than 50% of the country's electricity—and the remaining single unit is also on the verge of being shut down.

With non-essential lighting ordered to be turned off at night due to the power crisis, the beautiful nightscape that was once a symbol of the capital, Budapest, has disappeared.

The Krsko Nuclear Power Plant in Slovenia, which supplies electricity to Slovenia and Croatia, has also decided to lower its output as the flow rate of the Sava River, its cooling water source, has decreased.

[Zeljko Popic / Croatian Resident (translated): In the 55 years I've lived here, this is the first time the river water has dropped so low that old bridges down there have been exposed. But where have all the fish gone?]

In Germany and France, receding river waters have caused freight traffic on major canals to drop to less than a third of normal levels.

Damage to crops is also severe.

In the United Kingdom, where half the country has been declared to be in a state of rapidly developing flash drought, forecasts suggest that grain harvests will hit their lowest levels since statistics began being compiled in 1984.

The World Food Programme has warned that global food shortages could be a cause for concern through 2027 due to heatwaves and droughts.

(Video by Kim Si-nae | Video Editing by Lee Seung-yeol)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.