PARIS (AP) — France gritted its teeth Monday for a week of record-busting temperatures, sweltering under a grueling heat wave that combines daytime highs above 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) and sleep-robbing sweaty nights. The national weather service, Méteo France, said that most of the country — the largest in the European Union and second most populated — is entering what is described as a “plateau” of unrelenting heat-wave conditions that isn’t forecast to start easing before Friday at the earliest. Multiple towns in western and central France, including the major port of Saint-Nazaire on the Atlantic seaboard, with an overnight low of 23.2 C (73.8 F), experienced their hottest night ever Sunday to Monday, Méteo France said. Paris baked through its hottest night for a month of June, not getting below 24.2 C (75.5 F) — a half-degree hotter than the previous record from 2017. The weather service warned of even hotter nights. “This will continue through the end of the week, with heat levels never before recorded across more than three-quarters of the country on Wednesday and Thursday.” In a country without widespread air-conditioning, people, businesses and services tried to adapt as best they could. Hundreds of schools were closed on Monday and many hundreds more were canceling some classes, the education minister said. Broadcasts on the Paris transport network urged commuters to hydrate. Medical specialists took to the airwaves to warn of the potentially deadly cocktail of drinking alcohol in extreme heat. Authorities cracked down on alcohol consumption in public. Multiple…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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