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Britain counts cost of historic heatwave as 13 die

20 July 2022 17:49 (UTC +04:00)

At least 13 people have died in Britain while swimming during a spell of record-breaking hot weather that sparked wildfires, damaged train tracks and triggered warnings that efforts to tackle climate change needed to be stepped up, APA reports citing Reuters.

The London Fire Brigade endured its busiest day since World War Two on Tuesday when temperatures topped 40C (104 Fahrenheit) for the first time, igniting fires that destroyed dozens of properties in the capital and torched tinderbox-dry grassland at the sides of railway tracks and roads.

"We've got nothing, everything's gone," Timothy Stock, a resident who lost his home to fire in the village of Wennington, east of London, told the BBC.

Thirteen people lost their lives after "getting into difficulty in rivers, reservoirs and lakes while swimming in recent days — seven of them teenage boys," British minister Kit Malthouse told parliament on Wednesday.

At least 41 properties were destroyed in London and more than a dozen elsewhere in Britain, Malthouse said.