Americans who previously dismissed European complaints about summer heat are eating their words as a record-breaking heat wave has settled over much of the continent, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal published Friday.
Temperatures have approached 100 degrees Fahrenheit in the U.K. and topped that level in cities like Paris, the report said. While these highs are comparable to summer conditions in parts of the United States, the absence of air conditioning across much of Europe — especially Britain — has made them far more difficult to endure.
“I did get humbled,” Marissa Parks, a 30-year-old nurse who moved to London from Houston last year, told the Journal. “Being a Texan, it feels kind of embarrassing to be in London and be like, ‘I can’t handle the heat here.’”
Parks said she thought moving north of the equator would mean escaping brutal summers, but found that temperatures she would consider normal at home in Texas are impossible to bear without air conditioning. She and her husband tried to buy a portable AC unit, but they were all sold out, she said.
Lucy Kloc, a Florida native living in Manchester, said she used to tell her British boyfriend he was being a “weenie” about the summer heat. “Before, I was like ‘This is nothing, you’re just being a weenie about it,’” Kloc told the Journal. Now sweating through the heat wave, she said she’s ready to admit she was wrong. “I really did think they were just being dramatic, that it can’t be that bad,” Kloc said. “But it is.”
The Wall Street Journal described the week’s heat as the second major heat wave in two months for Europe. Only a small fraction of British households have air conditioning, the report noted, and even vacation rentals and some hotels lack cooling systems. European refrigerators rarely have built-in ice machines, and restaurants often serve drinks with only one or two ice cubes.
Abby Howard, a North Carolina native visiting London with her family, said a fan in the Airbnb “just blows hot air.” She told the Journal that the only relief came between 3 a.m. and 6 a.m., when temperatures dipped slightly.
Mallory Carrell, a 21-year-old from central Texas spending the summer in Germany, said she lived through a 2023 heat wave where temperatures hit at least 100 degrees Fahrenheit for 44 straight days. But the current one caught her by surprise. “Honestly I thought it was going to be a perfect, cool New England summer — it’s Europe,” she said. “Sure they have heat waves, but I thought ‘Whatever, I can handle some heat.’”
European guidance for coping with the heat remains to close shutters and windows during the day and to stay indoors and hydrate, the Journal reported. Carrell said following that advice felt “depressing” because she loves natural light.
Tourists have been forced to adapt. Kaitlyn Cameron, an American from Las Vegas now living in Sweden who is visiting London, told the Journal she carries a fan everywhere. “I’ve been walking around in a T-shirt carrying a fan everywhere. My fan is my best companion,” she said.
Kyle Scheele, a 40-year-old from Springfield, Missouri, came to the U.K. for a five-day hike through the Cotswolds expecting rainy days in the 60s and 70s. “I was like, that’ll be perfect. I packed jeans, a heavy jacket for the evening,” he said. “Then we got here and it was 92 degrees.” The couple stayed in tiny English inns and cottages without AC. At one hotel, Scheele said, he propped a small handheld fan he’d bought for a festival on a bedside table using his wallet. “It’s vibrating all night, trying to get air across both me and my wife with the tiniest fan you’ve ever seen,” he said.
Lucy Kloc said she has been spending her days moving a single fan from room to room and living on Popsicles and iced drinks. “We’re constantly filling up ice molds and waiting until they’re set,” she told the Journal. “Even whenever you go out and order a drink, it’s maybe one or two ice cubes.”
Despite the discomfort, Kloc saw at least one silver lining, telling the Journal the heat wave “unites the country because everyone is just as miserable.”