Over the last couple of days our weather news has focussed primarily on the monsoon rains across India but it's been rather stormy elsewhere.

A severe tropical storm currently sitting in the South China Sea has brought some heavy rain to parts of Southeast Asia. This storm, known as Chanthu, produced a lot of rain in Vietnam, especially the port city of Qui Nhon where 178mm has fallen. This brought significant flooding as it's over three times the average June rainfall of 48mm and ironic that it's on the day a report has been issued stating that a sixth of the world's population could be living in a flood danger zone by the year 2050 and the most vulnerable part of the world is Asia. Between 1987 and 1997, 44% of all flood disasters occurred in the region, claiming 228,000 lives and inflicting economic losses of #74 billion.

Heavy showers and thunderstorms developed yesterday across central and eastern parts of the United States. A huge storm crossed South Bend in Indiana, about 80 miles east of Chicago and close to Lake Michigan, dropping 54mm of rain in just a six hour period. To illustrate to you how extreme this was, there average June rainfall is around 90mm so it was just over half a month's worth.

There have been extreme conditions for many parts of Europe over the last few days, particularly Germany, Italy, the Balkans and eastern Mediterranean. On Thursday night, the town of Lahr in Germany recorded a low of just 18.3 Celsius, the average is 11C. Then on the following day 45mm of rain fell in Weissenburg, around half their monthly average. Similar storms struck Macedonia with the Prime Minister visiting the flooded region of Strumica as well as the viallage of Sacevo and Zubovo.

As our thoughts turn to football and the European Championships extreme heat has been recorded in Iberia. The Spanish city of Seville recorded a high of 37C on Friday afternoon, seven degrees above the average whilst yesterday in Portugal , Beja, just north of Faro saw the mercury climb to 37.6C just over ten degrees above their June average. Fortunately it won't be quite as hot for England's first round match against France this evening; conditions should be almost perfect, temperatures around the mid-twenties, fine, sunny and warm.

Weather News from the last five days:
12/06/2004
11/06/2004
10/06/2004
09/06/2004
08/06/2004

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