A British mother abandoned her Greek holiday and flew back to the UK three days early with her two children because it was too hot as the relentless Charon heat wave continues to scorch the Mediterranean.
Sally Urwin, 49, and her two children, aged 16 and 13, decided to cut their Rhodes holiday short after temperatures topped 40°C.
Sally complained that her hotel on the Greek island was turned into a “giant oven” due to sweltering heat, saying it’s “lovely to be back in a rainy, wet and cold UK”.
The author had landed in Rhodes on Wednesday for what was supposed to be a week-long relaxing holiday, but the “suffocating” heat wave forced them to spend the whole day at their hotel.
Sally, from Matfen, Northumberland, said: ‘It was sweltering. I have worked in Texas and around the world, but it was sweltering. It made you feel weak and dizzy.
Sally Urwin, 49, and her two children, aged 16 and 13, decided to cut their Rhodes holiday short after temperatures topped 40°C. In the image: the swimming pool of the hotel where the family was staying.
Sally complained that her hotel on the Greek island was turned into a “giant oven” due to sweltering heat, saying it’s “lovely to be back in a rainy, wet and cold UK”. Pictured: Sally with her husband Steve Urwin, who stayed behind in the UK on the family farm.
Sally described being on the beach in Rhodes as ‘unbearable’ due to the heat
“It could make you feel sick and lose your appetite, we couldn’t eat much.”
The heat became so unbearable at 43C that Sally booked an early flight home and landed back in a rainy UK on Sunday, three days before they were supposed to return.
“It was wonderful to be back in the UK – it’s rainy, wet and cold, it’s refreshing to be back,” said Sally.
The mother-of-two, whose husband Steve, a farmer, had stayed at home rather than go to Rhodes, said temperatures were hovering around 43C when they left Rhodes.
He said the only bearable time of the day when temperatures were low enough to leave the hotel was between 6:30 a.m. and 8:00 a.m. and after 7:00 p.m.
Sally said: ‘It was at least 43C when we left.
The way the hotel was designed was all fake marble and it was like a giant oven.
After posting about her experience online, she said internet trolls suggested she had “never been abroad before” or that it was “just a normal summer”, but Sally disagrees.
Sally said: ‘When we got there it was hot. I’ve had a lot of hot vacations, but it’s getting hotter all the time.
“We were all covered in sunscreen and the only way to keep cool was to sit in the water.
‘The children were so bored because we couldn’t do anything. I felt a little worried about some of the older Brits, some were a bit frail and didn’t go out at all.
Tourists across the Mediterranean have been told to stay indoors and avoid the beach during the hottest hours of the day, with experts warning that temperatures could break record 48.8°C and pose a risk to the tourist health.
The United Nations is warning British tourists and locals in southern Europe, including Italy, Greece and Spain, of the deadly dangers of the blazing sun after dozens collapsed and passed out due to the heat.
Sally said that the sweltering heat she has experienced in Rhodes means that she will now book her future Mediterranean holidays for May, when it won’t be so hot.
Sally sought shelter under an umbrella while on a beach in Rhodes during her family vacation.
Sally said that the only bearable time of the day when the temperatures were low enough to leave the hotel was between 6:30 am and 8:00 am and after 7:00 pm.
She said: ‘In the future, if I were to go anywhere in southern Europe, I would go in May and avoid July and August.
“Especially with the kids, I’ll definitely change my plans in the future and avoid places like that this time of year.”
It comes as the UN weather agency has warned that temperatures in southern Europe could even break the 48.8°C record set in Sicily in 2021, as desperate scientists urged the public to understand the “danger” in the world is facing due to climate change.
NASA climatologist Peter Kalmus warned: “Most people still don’t know what danger they are in.
This is going to be the coolest summer of the rest of their lives, and that shouldn’t just be a meme, it should really be scary”. The only way out of this thermal nightmare is to end fossil fuels as soon as possible.’
Concerns are growing that the heat, which has already claimed lives in Italy, will lead to a rise in deaths. “Heat waves really are an invisible killer,” Panu Saaristo, team leader at the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies’ emergency health unit, said today. “We are experiencing higher and higher temperatures for longer periods of time every summer here in Europe.”
In response to the potentially record-breaking heat, Red Cross teams in Italy are checking in on the elderly by phone, while in Italy they have taken to social media to tell people not to leave pets or children in parked cars.
In Greece, volunteers handed out drinking water, while in Spain they reminded people to protect themselves from breathing in the smoke from the forest fires that are ripping through the country.
