How hot will it get today? - as 'extreme' sweltering weather continues

Hampshire is preparing itself for another scorcher today as bumper temperatures continue and will hit the 30s again.

The county remains in the Met Office ‘red’ alert warning area with more ‘extreme’ temperatures expected after official records recorded the city being in the low 30s, with new record temperature of 36.1C for June recorded in Gosport. This beat the record held since the infamous summer of 1976.

In Portsmouth the temperatures are expected to hit around 34 degrees between 3pm and 6pm.

The sweltering heatwave has led to “awful conditions” in hospitals, schools and nurseries are closed or operating early pick-up times or relaxing uniform rules, while train services and court hearings have also been disrupted.

The Met Office said it is possible the June record could be beaten again. If temperatures reach 39C, that would make it the second hottest day in the UK on record. If 38C is recorded, that is still in the top five days ever recorded and hotter than any day of the 20th century.

Red heat health alerts have been issued by the UK Health Security Agency for Hampshire is in place until 11pm on Friday, and mean “adverse temperatures are likely to impact on the health and wellbeing of the population”.

The latest heatwave has prompted renewed calls for the UK to be better prepared for the rising risk of extreme heat that a changing climate is bringing, including cooling for hospitals, schools and care homes, heat regulations for workplaces, and to prepare infrastructure against rising temperatures.

It comes as Queen Alexandra Hospital is in the middle of a ‘critical incident’ after its chiller units failed - affecting digital systems and critical clinical services, including theatres, cardiac catheter laboratories (cath labs), and diagnostic scanning facilities.

This saw office based staff urged to work from home, with lights and non essential equipment also being turned off to reduce the pressure on the chillers battling the record-breaking temperatures. Some non urgent appointments were also cancelled.

The Royal College of Physicians said doctors have described severe, unsustainable pressure on the workforce, with very few settings having air conditioning, staff “really struggling” and resident doctors battling the heat while sleep deprived.

One physician has warned “conditions are awful” due to overcrowding, another said two machines used to treat cancer had stopped amid the heatwave, and there had been reports of patients on geriatric wards – one of the groups most vulnerable to heat – facing temperatures of up to 35C.

Almost one in five employers have no measures to help workers cope with the heat, according to the Chartered Management Institute, with an uneven response to the heatwave.

Its survey of 1,000 managers found a third said their company had relaxed dress codes, while a quarter said flexible working hours were being offered, and a minority reported other measures such as free refreshments, additional breaks and reduced workloads.