[Edit: France Already Demolishing..?] [alas, a bit of a pull back! but that feels more accurate]
Whether it’s on a bicycles for the Tour de France or in the mercury slurry of a thermometer, the French can move fast when they want to. So fast, in fact, that the country has blasted past the temperature threshold set by a hypothetical forecast imagining what an August heatwave in the year 2050 might look like.
The original forecast, made in 2014 by French meteorologist and broadcaster Évelyne Dhéliat, predicted August temperatures ranging from 79 to 109 degrees Fahrenheit at 34 cities throughout the country. On Wednesday, 19 of these 34 locales exceeded those doomsday predictions, and the rest of France wasn’t too far behind.
“What the weather presenters created are only possible scenarios, and not true forecasts,” caveated World Meteorological Organization spokesperson Clare Nullis in a statement to the Washington Post, which first reported the phenomenon. “Nevertheless, they are based on climate science, to try to explain to the public what life could be like on a warmer planet.”
In its reporting, WaPo which noted that temperatures reached as high as 112.3 degrees Fahrenheit in real life, far exceeding the theoretical temps by more than 20 degrees in some cities.
It comes as Western Europe suffers from a deadly week-long heatwave. On Tuesday, France experienced its hottest single day on record, prompting officials to close both the Louvre museum and the Eiffel Tower.
In late May, a similarly oppressive European heat dome clashed with the French Open, causing top-rated tennis players to collapse on the clay of the Stade Roland-Garros.
More on extreme heat: Scientists Horrified as Huge Heatwave Hits Antarctica