Europe sizzled in a continent-wide heatwave on Wednesday, with London bracing for Britain’s hottest June day since 1976 with the mercury hitting 30C and above. The intense heatwave has melted roads, causing police to issue warnings to drivers and council staff to send out gritters.
While people have been enjoying the continuous sunshine, the hot weather has caused havoc for drivers. Cambridgeshire council was forced to put gritters on the roads after motorists complained that their tyres had started “ripping the tarmac off the roads,” the Daily Telegraph reported.
Evan Laughlin, from Cambridgeshire County Council, told the paper gritters had been used to distribute granite dust to stabilise the road surface and stop bitumen becoming stuck on wheels. “Normally the roads stand the summer temperatures we get, but just this week it’s very hot,” she said.
In Manchester, some materials on the roads became sufficiently pliable for one person to be able to scrawl the word ‘hot’, the Manchester Evening News reported.
A driver in Lancashire, found out the hard way that the roads were melting, as he found himself scraping a sticky mess off his shoes. A commuter in Croydon decided to skip the tram after she spotted what she believed to be tarmac melting, and heard the trams making a “grinding” noise as they went over them. Photographer Sarah Preece was walking to a local market when she saw the black seal around the tracks had started to melt.
A Daily Mail reported that an iPhone melted after it was left under direct sunlight for an hour. The soaring temperatures scorched the insides of the smartphone beyond repair.
