In Greece, too, there are no signs of an imminent end to the heat wave that is dominating large parts of southern Europe.

On the island of Rhodes, where the fire brigade, reinforced with units from Athens, reported partial success in the fight against forest fires on Monday, temperatures of up to 42 degrees were expected.

In other parts of the country, after several days of temperatures around 44 degrees on Tuesday, values ​​of up to 47 degrees are to be expected, according to meteorologists.

Michael Martens

Correspondent for Southeast European countries based in Vienna.

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Heat of just over 40 degrees is by no means unusual in many parts of Greece in July and August.

In Athens, temperatures of 42 or 43 degrees due to the very dry climate of the Greek capital are easier to bear than 35 degrees in humid Istanbul.

But the length and intensity of the heat this summer are unusual even by Greek standards.

The current heat wave is considered to be the worst in the country since 1987. At that time, more than 1000 people were killed as a result of the heat, when temperatures of over 40 degrees were constant for more than a week and even at night rarely less than 30 degrees.

Unlike today, air conditioning was not part of the standard in apartments and houses back then, which in particular cost old people their lives.

But the fact that almost all apartments, shops and restaurants in Greece are air-conditioned nowadays harbors another danger that the government of Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has been warning of these days. It is feared that the power grid will be overloaded by the many air conditioning systems that are running at full capacity. So it had apparently happened on Sunday in Rhodes, where a major fire may have been the reason that large parts of the island remained without power for hours in the middle of the heat. The authorities have therefore called for electricity consumption to be as sparing as possible.

The population was asked not to set air conditioning systems to the lowest possible temperature. People were also asked not to use washing machines and other energy-intensive household appliances at lunchtime and in the afternoon when electricity consumption is highest. Unlike in previous years, however, the forest fires have not caused any deaths in Greece so far.