Severe weather has gripped the globe this week, with record-shattering, deadly heat in Western Europe. In the US, heat, wind and drought conditions fueled wildfires in the Southwest, while heavy thunderstorms, wind and floods caused destruction in eastern and central states.
Scientists attribute these extremes to fossil fuel–driven climate change. Europe’s heatwave would have been “virtually impossible to occur at this time of year” 50 years ago, scientists from the World Weather Attribution group reported. The project’s Theodore Keeping of Imperial College London told reporters (EuroNews, 6/26/26):
The science of how climate change is worsening heatwaves is settled…. Continued fossil-fuel emissions are directly responsible for the disruption people are experiencing this week in their homes, schools and workplaces.
With extreme weather events worsening each year, and the world on track to surpass by 2030 the Paris Agreement’s attempt to limit global heating to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, connecting these disruptive and deadly events to climate change is a key part of the story.
Yet on the evening of Tuesday, June 23, despite leading their shows with severe weather headlines, nightly news shows on NBC, ABC and CBS failed to mention climate even in passing.
Cropping out climate
NBC Nightly News (6/23/26) had a tight shot of UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres…
Substitute anchor Hallie Jackson began the NBC Nightly News (6/23/26) by describing apocalyptic scenes around the globe:
Tonight, the dangerous triple weather threat with fires, floods and deadly heat affecting millions. The flash flood emergency here at home: Fast-moving waters trapping drivers and washing out roads. Wildfires exploding out West. Plus, overseas, a record-shattering heatwave in Europe leaving dozens dead.
The broadcast covered heavy rains in Oklahoma, wildfires in Utah and Nevada, and heat and fire in Miami disrupting World Cup events. In France, it was so hot, Paris shut down the Eiffel Tower Tuesday, and Wednesday was expected to reach a 102°F record. More than 40 people were believed to have drowned in France’s rivers and beaches while trying to escape the heatwave that began last week.
In London, NBC’s Danielle Hamamdjian reported record highs in the city on Tuesday, with even higher temperatures anticipated to come.
The broadcast then cut to a clip of UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres saying, “And today this city—and far beyond—are experiencing the hottest day of the year—with higher temperatures to come.”
The event that he was speaking at—London Climate Action Week—was not identified. In fact, a banner with the London Climate Action Week logo that was behind Guterres was cropped out of the shot. The soundbite NBC featured was excised from Guterres’ longer remarks about the severity of climate change and the critical necessity of quickly and justly transitioning from fossil fuels:
We have just lived through the 11 hottest years ever recorded. And today this city—and far beyond—are experiencing the hottest day of the year—with higher temperatures to come. London isn’t just calling—it’s cooking. Around the world, climate disasters are becoming more frequent, more destructive and more costly. And the World Meteorological Organization has warned we ain’t seen nothing yet. El Niño is not just knocking on the door. It risks blowing the house down. Turning up the heat. Disrupting food and water systems. And hitting the vulnerable the hardest. Ten years ago, world leaders agreed in Paris to limit global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius. Now scientists say average annual temperatures will exceed that threshold in the coming years.
Later in the speech, Guterres demanded that AI companies publicly disclose their energy usage and commit to powering data centers with renewables by 2030.
From a speech entirely about climate change and its tangible impacts, NBC Nightly News managed to cherrypick a soundbite of Guterres essentially saying nothing more than “it’s hot.” While the segment linked together these extreme weather events in Europe and the US as a global phenomenon, climate change didn’t even get a passing mention.
Records broken by unknown force
ABC World News Tonight (6/23/26) reported on weather like there was no such thing as climate.
ABC World News Tonight (6/23/26) with David Muir followed suit. Raising the alarm about tornadoes and flood watches in the east, severe storm threats in Texas, Oklahoma, Colorado and Wyoming, extreme heat in the southwest and heatwaves in France, England, Italy and Spain, the broadcast didn’t mention the word “climate” once.
“We’ve lived here for 20 years and I’ve never seen anything like this,” a Fairfax County, Virginia, man said of the winds and storms that sent trees into cars and homes in the area.
CBS Evening News (6/23/26) led with fires, droughts, floods and storms across the US, spotlighting Utah, where one wildfire was the size of San Francisco. “The outbreak follows the state’s warmest winter on record and one of the driest, with just a fifth of normal snowpack,” said host Tony Dokoupil.
In the next segment, correspondent Leigh Kiniry reported from London about record temperatures across Europe. Uniquely among the corporate networks’ evening newscasts, this report alluded vaguely to climate change, noting that “the continent is warming faster than any other.” But viewers were given no clue as to how or why: Direct mentions of climate change were nonexistent throughout the entire broadcast.
‘Not one government is making progress’
PBS NewsHour (6/23/26): “But with the changing climate, what hope is there for family farmers?”
The lone exception to the erasure of climate change on the nightly news broadcasts was PBS NewsHour (6/23/26). While the show didn’t lead headlines with extreme weather, its segment about the European heatwave included a soundbite from a Paris resident expressing dissatisfaction with how governments have ignored climate change. “Paris when temperatures go high is just hell on earth,” she said:
It’s catastrophic. I’m worried for the coming years. We have known about climate change for a while, and not one government is making progress on this issue.
Later in the broadcast, PBS dedicated a segment to droughts in the Southern US affecting farmers in Georgia. The report was part of an ongoing PBS series called Tipping Point, which focuses on the impacts of climate change and communities’ efforts to adapt.
Rachel Cleetus of the Union of Concerned Scientists explained:
Climate change is making these more frequent, both the short-duration kinds of droughts that we’re seeing in some places, but also the longer megadroughts like the Southwest is experiencing. The unpredictability of it, the extremes, both the droughts and then the whiplash with extreme rainfall events, that makes it very difficult to plan for these kinds of conditions.
The report went on to describe precision irrigation systems as a possible mitigation—though noting that their cost is often prohibitive. The segment points to “policy steps worth considering,” like helping farmers obtain these technologies through grants and low-cost loans.
PBS deserves credit as the only nightly broadcast that mentioned climate change at all. But while it addressed the issue of adaptation, it avoided the more fundamental question of causation; the burning of fossil fuels, and its connection to the segment’s weather horror stories, wasn’t mentioned at all.
FAIR (7/18/23) has previously documented that even when TV news connects extreme weather events to climate change, it seldom connects climate change to fossil fuels—but the industry seems to have taken a step backward.
The lack of climate coverage in legacy media follows a trend media analysts have been tracking since President Donald Trump’s second term began. A Media Matters study (3/4/26) found that ABC, CBS and NBC aired 35% less climate coverage in 2025 than in 2024. A FAIR study (4/14/26) found that trend mirrored in online news. But as coverage decreases, climate change’s effects only increase in frequency and severity.
FAIR’s work is sustained by our generous contributors, who allow us to remain independent. Donate today to be a part of this important mission.
Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.Donald Trump urges you to be a Climate Science denier like him. He says that he makes millions and millions for destroying the planet, Burn, Baby, Burn and Flood, Baby, Flood.Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
According to the Times report, Farage has found himself linked with five whole houses since 2020 – the year we officially left the EU:
His main residence – a £1.42m five-bedroom gaff in Surrey (Grade II listed).
His £885,000 Clacton residency – officially owned by his partner Laure Ferrari.
A Kent residency he lived in with his ex-wife (currently occupied by his daughter Isabelle Farage and an unidentified man).
Two beachfront properties owned through his production company, Thorn in the Side Ltd.
As reported:
The Times understands the Tandridge property is the Surrey woodland lodge, and the Folkestone and Hythe property is one of the Kent beachfront homes owned via his company. This means the Kent village property, the second beachfront home and the Essex address are not on the register.
Farage does not have to declare the Essex home because legally it is owned entirely by his partner. However, the case with the other two properties is less clear.
The Times spoke to a number of experts who mostly agreed that Farage should have erred on the side of caution and declared the properties. Does this mean he’ll get in trouble? It’s hard to say given what politicians usually get away with, but it’s certainly another case in which he’s given the impression that he’s on the blag.
…
dizzy: I’d say that Farage is far from open and honest about his affairs …
Nigel Farage reminds you that he’s the man that brought you Brexit and asks what could possibly go wrong.Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.Elon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
Outside court in London, Greta Thunberg says “We must remember who the real enemy is … who our laws are meant to protect.” Quoted from https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-68166341
We need change urgently. To try to bring that change, let’s think of where we want to be in 5 years time or sooner if possible. You’re all welcome to get on board, think and publish where you want to be in 5 years or less.
Some yet to be thought through ideas
Climate action is needed urgently. The rich are properly recognised as responsible for being the most damaging to climate. Tax the rich out of existence. Convert super-yachts to housing, do away with private jets.
A government committed to protecting climate
Proportional Representation.
Convict and lock-up war criminals.
Replace Fascist legal / judicial system.
Replace the House of Lords
1.10 a.m. 3/7/26 If we have a rough idea what we want to achieve in 5 years then we can assess our progress towards that target. For example, we expect a general election in UK in 2 or 3 years time and that would be a good opportunity to push our intentions.
An end to all fossil-fuel subsidies.
No further development of North Sea extraction i.e. Rosebank or Jackdaw.
Promotion of ethics and the non-promotion of opposition to ethical behaviour e.g. Palantir, Israel.
Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch delivers a speech on the economy at Victory Services Club, central London, June 29, 2026
TORY leader Kemi Badenoch was accused today of a Trumpian obsession in a pro-oil and gas speech.
Ms Badenoch said the economy was “in limbo” while businesses waited to see what Andy Burnham would do if he became the next prime minister.
“Britain is facing a summer of chaos,” she said in a speech in London.
“It is time to get Britain drilling again and if Andy Burnham had any sense, he would sack [Energy Secretary] Ed Miliband, not make him chancellor.”
The MP for North West Essex has previously called for more oil and gas drilling in the North Sea.
Uplift deputy director Robert Palmer said: “Kemi Badenoch’s Trumpian obsession with oil and gas is blinding the Conservative Party to the reality of how climate change is affecting Britain right now.”
He said last week’s heatwave had seen schools shut, trains stopped and people’s health suffering, with likely fatalities, arguing that continued fossil fuel burning is driving more frequent and intense heatwaves in Britain.
“The science is clear, there can be no new oil fields if we want to stay within safe climate targets,” Mr Palmer said.
“Yet Kemi Badenoch’s response is to want to abandon those targets and drill even more.
“Pushing ahead with this reckless approach will leave ordinary people paying the price, through more extreme heat, more damaging floods, and the rising costs that come with climate breakdown.
“Either Kemi Badenoch believes, like Trump, that climate change is a ‘con job’ or she is simply willing to ignore the consequences for us and our children.”
He warned more drilling would not cut energy bills but would increase oil company profits and worsen the climate crisis, calling it “profoundly irresponsible.”
Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.UK Conservative Party leader Kemi ‘not a genocide’ Badenoch explains her reality that the Earth is flat, the Moon is made of cheese and that she was born from Unicorn horn dust
For the second time in two months, western and central Europe has been hit by a record-breaking heatwave.
Temperature records have toppled in multiple countries, with France seeing its “hottest day ever” for two days running and the UK, Spain and Switzerland breaking records for June.
A rapid-response attribution study has concluded that “climate change is unequivocally to blame”, noting that the scorching temperatures would have been “virtually impossible” 50 years ago.
The research also found that the sweltering overnight temperatures seen this week are “100 times” more likely today than they were in 2003 when Europe was hit by a deadly summer heatwave.
The extreme conditions come on the 50th anniversary of a historic 1976 heatwave in the UK, prompting many comparisons of the two events from scientists and the media.
In this article, Carbon Brief looks at how the heatwave developed and the role climate change played.
The “very intense and widespread” heat began to develop in the south of France as early as 13 June, reported Le Monde, before it began to “intensify and move northward” in the following days.
The heatwave was caused by a phenomenon known as an “omega block”, which is a “rare weather pattern” that can trap intense heat over a particular area “for extended periods”, said the Independent.
The Daily Telegraph explained the pattern’s development as a four-step process.
First, it said, the jet stream moves across the Atlantic Ocean, creating a high pressure ridge to the south. The “omega” shape is created by low pressure systems on either side of the meander. This “stalls” the normal flow of weather systems from west to east and “pulls hot air from Africa northward over Europe”, creating a “lid” that traps the heat. This leads to the development of a heat dome, “driving temperatures higher”, it added.
This heat dome “originated in the hot and humid sub-tropics” and has been “centred” over France, said BBC News.
France experienced its “hottest day ever” on two consecutive days, with its “national heat index” – an average of day- and night-time high temperatures from 30 weather stations across the country – reaching 30C on 24 June, according to Le Monde.
On 25 June, Méteo-France announced that 72 of France’s 96 mainland administrative districts had been placed under a red heatwave alert.
The heatwave “spread to other parts of western Europe” as the week progressed, said BBC News.
Spain recorded a daily average of 28.2C on 23 June – a record temperature for that month, the outlet reported.
The UK surpassed its long-standing temperature record for June of 35.6C multipletimeson 24, 25 and 26 June, with a new record set on 24 June at 36.1C in Gosport, Hampshire, which was subsequently exceeded on 25 June with 36.7C at Merryfield, Somerset and on 26 June with 37.3C at Santon Downham in Suffolk.
“Temperatures exceeding 40C” are predicted for the weekend of 27-28 June in Italy, while 16 cities have been placed under heat alerts, according to Corriere della Sera.
Germany also saw temperature records tumble, where the heatwave is the “longest-ever recorded” for June, said Deutsche Welle.
The Financial Times said Germany was bracing for 41C temperatures over the weekend of 27-28 June and reported that Austria’s weather agency has warned Vienna could hit a record 40C.
Meanwhile, Switzerland’s national weather agency declared temperatures had exceeded 38C for the first time in June, breaking a record set in 1947, according to RTS.
(All of these new records are considered provisional until they have been validated and verified by each national met service.)
Scientists from the World Weather Attribution service analysed the wet-bulb globe temperature in 854 cities across 30 European countries and found that 45% have broken, or are expected to break, their June heat-stress record since 18 June.
(Wet-bulb globe temperature is a heat-stress index that combines temperature, humidity, wind speed and direct sunlight.)
These record-breaking cities are shown in pink on the map below.
Cities that have broken (or are forecasted to break) their June heat-stress records over 18-30 June (pink) and those that have not broken records (grey). Source: World Weather Attribution (2026)
While temperatures are expected to “gradually decline” across western Europe from 26 June onwards, “countries in eastern Europe were bracing for a scorching weekend”, according to the New York Times.
A separate New York Times article noted that “local factors” – such as melting sea ice, lower air pollution and less snow cover – mean that “for the past three decades, Europe has been warming faster than any other continent”.
The outlet added that these factors can also impact atmospheric conditions “in ways that could be making searing heatwaves like the one this week more frequent”.
As temperatures climbed on Sunday 21 June, several cities and towns – including Paris – introduced restrictions for the nationwide “fête de la musique” celebration, reported the Guardian. This included bans on performances before 7pm and outdoor drinking, it said.
Le Parisien reported that the government announced that more than 845 schools would not open on Monday 22 June, while another 1,800 were rescheduling classes.
On 23 June, as average temperatures in France reached an all-time high, prime minister Sébastien Lecornu announced that more than 40 people had drowned as they sought relief from the heat, reported Libération.
Analysis from Agence France-Presse covered by the Guardian on 24 June showed that 54 of France’s administrative departments had recorded temperatures of 40C and higher since the heatwave began.
France24 reported that a power cut caused by the heat had left 68,000 households in Brittany, north-west France, without electricity. Meanwhile, Le Monde reported a jump of 15-20% in calls to the French emergency health services.
On 25 June, Ouest-France reported that 25 cardiac arrests had been reported over a 24-hour period in Paris – a significant increase on the typical number of “around 10”.
The Financial Times said temperatures reached 41C in Paris on 25 June, noting that “heat-absorbing zinc rooftops” had caused temperatures in apartment buildings to “soar”.
It added that nighttime temperatures had been most extreme in France, with some areas enduring 30C heat.
The UK Met Office issued a “red warning” for extreme heat on 24 June, 25 June and 26 June – noting that this was the “first time in the history of the current weather warnings system” that it had issued red heat warnings on three consecutive days.
The UK Health Security Agency also issued red alerts – indicating that “severe impacts are expected across health and social care services due to the high temperatures” – for much of the country.
Schools, hospitals, transport networks and water companies were all left “struggling to cope” with the high temperatures, wrote the Guardian. Schools across southern England and Wales closed, while rail services were cut and speeds lowered, it said.
Temperatures on the London Underground’s Central line reached nearly 40C, according to the Independent, which took readings on several lines. It noted that “only around 40%” of the network’s trains are air-conditioned.
Several events at London Climate Action Week were cancelled or moved online, giving a “textbook example of how the world is being forced to adapt to increasingly extreme heat”, wrote Wired.
On 26 June, the i newspaper reported that 1,200 schools in the UK had been closed and six hospitals had declared “critical incidents”.
BBC News said that the London Ambulance Service had responded to a record number of call outs for life-threatening emergencies”, while the Guardian detailed reports from doctors of “radiotherapy machines and MRI scanners failing, critical IT systems stalling and cooling units that serve entire hospitals breaking down”.
The extreme heat has also swept through other European countries.
Euronews reported that 22 and 23 June were the hottest June days on record in mainland Spain since at least 1950. It added that “the current heatwave is bringing temperatures to between 5-10C above normal across much of the country”.
Separately, Euronews reported that across Spain, many municipalities had called off their San Juan celebrations, which usually involve lighting bonfires.
France24 reported that extreme heat between 21 and 24 June had been linked to an estimated 212 excess deaths across Spain, according to the country’s “mortalidad y modelos” monitoring system.
Reuters reported that “an extreme heat warning was in place across the Netherlands, where outdoor sports were cancelled, public transport was scaled down and schools shortened classes or closed as temperatures were expected to soar to 36C”.
It added that, in Switzerland, local authorities opened air-conditioned theatres for free daytime cinema screenings.
Meanwhile, Agence France-Presse reported that Belgium’s national train operator had removed “some” non-air-conditioned trains from service, while France’s SNCF had cancelled 10% of trains in the Paris region to avoid overheating the tracks.
The record-breaking temperatures recorded over Europe this week would have been “virtually impossible” 50 years ago, according to a rapid analysis from the World Weather Attribution service.
The study, published on 26 June, found that “climate change is unequivocally to blame”.
To identify the fingerprint of human-caused climate change on the extreme heat, the study authors used climate models to compare the world as it is today to a cooler “counterfactual” world. This is called an attribution study.
The analysis focuses on a large area of Europe encompassing Belgium, Denmark, France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and the UK, as well as parts of Italy, Norway, Spain and Sweden.
The authors simulated the three-day maximum June daytime temperatures and three-day minimum June night-time temperatures over the study area in today’s climate, which has already warmed by 1.4C due to human-caused climate change.
They then simulated the same June heatwave in a climate 1.1C and 0.6C cooler than today. These global warming levels approximate the average global temperatures in 1976 and 2003, respectively.
The study authors said they chose these two years because both saw record-breaking summerheatwaves hit Europe which were linked to devastating impacts including thousands of deaths.
If the atmospheric conditions that drove this week’s heatwave had hit Europe in 1976 and 2003, the resulting heatwaves would have been 3.5C and 2C cooler, respectively, the researchers found. Meanwhile, night-time temperatures would have been 2.4C and 1.3C cooler in June 1976 and 2003, respectively.
The study added:
“The sweltering overnight temperatures keeping many people awake this week are about 100 times more likely today than they were just 23 years ago during the infamous 2003 European heatwave. The daytime peaks are about 10 times more likely.”
“Human-driven climate change has provided the springboard for this event, loading the atmosphere with extra heat and making extreme temperatures far more intense than they would have been in the past”.
With an average temperature of 15.7C, the summer of 1976 was the hottest on record at the time. That record stood for more than 25 years, before being surpassed by the summer of 2003 and then also 2006, 2018, 2022 and 2025.
The duration of the 1976 heatwave made the event extraordinary, including 15 consecutive days where temperatures of at least 32.2C were recorded somewhere in the country.
The heatwave arrived towards the end of a record-breaking drought that started the year before. The period from May 1975 to August 1976 holds the record for the lowest 16-month total rainfall in England and Wales.
At the time, the 1976 heatwave tied the record – with 1957 – for the maximum June temperature in the UK. A temperature of 35.6C was recorded at Mayflower Park in Southampton on 28 June.
That record remained until it was beaten on three consecutive days this year, with 36.1C recorded in Gosport, Hampshire on 24 June, then 36.7C at Merryfield, Somerset on 25 June and 37.3C at Santon Downham, Suffolk on 26 June.
June 1976 also held the record for the UK’s highest minimum temperature – that is, how warm conditions remain overnight – of 22.7C in Ventnor Park on the Isle of Wight. That has now been surpassed with a recorded temperature of 23.5C in Bute Park in Cardiff.
To mark the 50th anniversary of the 1976 heatwave, the Met Office and University of Reading analysed what a comparable event would look like in today’s climate.
Shown in the maps below, the findings show that a similar event to 1976 (left-hand map) would already be around 3C hotter today (right–hand map), with peak temperatures of 38C or 39C.
Maps showing UK maximum daily temperatures on 3 July 1976 (left) and for a comparable heatwave in today’s climate (right). Credit: Met Office and University of Reading
As climate change continues, “1976-style events will become increasingly common over the next two decades”, said Prof Ed Hawkins in a University of Reading press release:
“What felt like a freak weather event to grandparents in 1976 will become the new normal for their grandchildren.”
Hawkins also noted on social media that the heat in 1976 was “less humid”, with “much cooler nights”, adding that “peak night time temperatures were around 16C back then”.
The summer of 1976 became a benchmark for later periods of extreme heat and drought, both for contingency planning and in popular culture.
In recent days, for example, commentary in climate-sceptic newspapers has often referred back to 1976 as a time without “heatwave hysterics” and “nanny state warnings”, or when the heat was taken “in our stride”,.
Much of this commentary has been critical of school closures – for example, arguing that it is “defeatist”.
Yet, although hundreds of schools have announced full or partial closures this week, the summer of 1976 also saw schools close early or allow parents to keep their children home.
There was also prominent coverage in other countries that have seen extreme heat, such as on the frontpages of El País in Spain and Die Welt in Germany.
Some outlets were clear about the dangers of extreme heat, as well as the role of climate change in driving it. They led their coverage with public health warnings and details of how the heat was negatively impacting people’s lives.
A Daily Express editorial urged readers to “stay safe” and to shelter indoors with fans, while Ouest-France had a frontpage story about how the heat “threatens our health”. A Guardian frontpage asked if such extremes, “driven by [the] climate crisis”, were “the new normal”.
Noting the “muted response” from the UK government to recent warnings about the need for climate adaptation, a Guardian editorial said it hoped “this week’s heat will focus minds”. It added:
“A strong adaptation plan – to run in parallel with the green transition – cannot wait.”
The Independent also argued via an editorial that climate change must be treated with “the urgency the moment demands”, given the “all-too-obvious need to increase resilience”.
Similarly, an editorial in Le Monde criticised the French government’s “flagrant unpreparedness” for heatwaves. It, too, stressed the need for adaptation and said:
“The fight against global warming must be seen as a new paradigm, within which a broad range of public policies must be considered. Simply reacting to events is no longer enough.”
Yet, even amid warnings of “killer heat” approaching 40C, much of the news coverage in UK media was relatively frivolous, often focusing on the positive aspects of the heat.
The Times publishedstories about “what the fashion A-list are wearing in the heatwave” and “surprising positives to a British heatwave”. On the day after the UK reached its highest-ever June temperature, the Daily Mail featured a story about King Charles using an electric handheld fan on its frontpage.
Often, alongside warnings of “red alerts” and “meltdown”, news outlets illustrated their stories with photos of people relaxing on the beach and children playing in fountains.
Some writers misleadingly compared the heatwave to similar events in 1957 and 1976. In the Evening Standard, one writer said this year’s heat has “got nothing on the summer of 1976”. A Daily Mail article claimed that in 1957 “the sunshine was greeted by national rejoicing”.
In contrast, a comment piece in the Daily Express erroneously stated that the UK was facing “Covid-like shutdown” due to the heat and the Sun took aim at the “nannying, alarmist state”. A Daily Telegraph editorial said the government was “treat[ing] the public like children”. It said:
“It may well be that the country will have to learn to live with higher temperatures in future. Britain cannot close its schools, cancel its trains and shut down its offices every time the sun comes out.”
Media coverage of the heatwave in the UK has been criticised for failing to mention climate change and for using imagery that does not convey the health risks associated with the extreme weather.
On 23 June, a group of climate scientists wrote to senior editors at BBC News, ITV News, Channel 4 News, 5 News, Sky News and LBC owner Global, as well as to media regulators Ofcom and IPSO, to urge them to “use their power to inform public audiences of the scientific links between extreme weather, climate change and net-zero”.
In a letter, reproduced in the Press Gazette, the scientists said they wanted to express their concern about recent coverage of extreme heat. They argued that the UK public was “frequently not well served with clear information about the scientifically indisputable connection between greenhouse gas emissions and extreme heat”.
Prof Mark Hannon from the University of Strathclyde was among a number of academics on Bluesky to note how some parts of the UK media had failed to explain that climate change was causing the extreme heat. He said:
“Amazing how much coverage the heat – and the symptoms of climate change – is getting on outlets like the BBC, but how little coverage is typically given over to the causes of climate change.”
Others pointed to a disconnect between discussions around net-zero policies and the recent weather.
Other researchers – including University College London’s Prof Bill McGuire and Cardiff University’s Prof Ian Hall – criticisednational newspapers’ choice of beach photos to illustrate articles about the UK’s “red weather warning”.
“Your happy and clickable ‘kids in lido’‚ ‘dogs playing in fountain’‚ ‘family eats ice cream’ photos to illustrate news reports about the heatwave are journalistic malpractice.”
Update: This article was updated on 26 June to include further new record-high June temperatures for the UK.
Power-mad orange gasbag Donald Trump says Burn, Baby, Burn.Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.Orcas discuss rotting brain, front Orca says Sundown Syndrome is a dead givaway and he wishes someone would Lock Him Up
Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch delivers a speech on the economy at Victory Services Club, central London, June 29, 2026
