Unprecedented April heat hits Central and Eastern Europe
By Jeff Masters
1 May 2012 A European heat wave of unparalleled intensity for so early in the year smashed all-time April heat records over much of Central and Eastern Europe on Saturday and Sunday. According to wunderground’s weather historian Christopher C. Burt, and weather records researcher Maximiliano Herrera, new national April heat records were set in Belarus, Germany, Austria, Lithuania, Moldova, and Poland, and hundreds of stations in Germany, Austria, France, Italy, Hungary, Moldova, Romania, Poland, Belarus, Ukraine, Lithuania, Latvia, Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Russia recorded their hottest April temperatures on record. Moscow hit 28.6°C (84°F) on Sunday, the hottest April reading in the city since record keeping began 130 years ago. The culprit for the heat wave and French tornado is a large low pressure system off the coast of France whose counter-clockwise flow has been pumping hot air from the Sahara Desert northwards into Europe. The low is expected to continue to bring unusually hot weather to most of Central and Eastern Europe for the remainder of the week. New all-time April national heat records set over the past few days:
- Poland: 31.7°C (89.18°F) at Tomaszow on 4/29
- Germany: 32.2°C (90.0°F) at Munich on 4/28
- Austria: 31.8°C (89.2°F) at Ranshoten on 4/28
- Belarus: 30.4°C ( 86.7°F) at Zitovici on 4/29
- Moldova 32.5°C
- Lithuania
