The UK Health Security Agency and the Met Office have put a yellow heat-health alert in place from 2pm today until September 10, with parts of Sussex and southeast England set to experience a heatwave. It means the temperatures forecast for the region may affect the health of the public.
Temperatures will continue to rise in the early part of this week, peaking on Wednesday and Thursday with 32C possible in isolated areas.
Met Office deputy chief meteorologist Mark Sidaway said: “High pressure is situated to the southeast of the UK, which is bringing more settled conditions with temperatures on the rise through the first half of this week.
“While the highest temperatures are expected in the south, heatwave conditions are likely across much of England and Wales especially, with parts of Scotland and Northern Ireland also likely to see some unseasonably high temperatures.
“An active tropical cyclone season in the North Atlantic is helping to amplify the pattern across the ocean, and has pushed the jet stream well to the north of the UK, allowing some very warm air to be drawn north.
“It is a marked contrast to much of meteorological summer, when the UK was on the northern side of the jet stream with cooler air and more unsettled weather.”
In addition to high daytime temperatures, it is expected to remain “uncomfortably warm” overnight, with a chance of conditions above 20C in the south.
Temperatures will gradually decline into the weekend, though the southeast is expected to retain the warm weather the longest.
It comes as hundreds of people flocked to Brighton beach over the weekend as temperatures soared, with many taking a dip in the sea as the summer holidays came to an end.
The Met Office has said there is a chance that the warmer weather could also continue into the start of next week in the south of England, but will be slightly cooler from the highs expected in a few days’ time.
