The father of the boy, named Declan Sawyer, issued a warning to other families about the dangers of children "playing near any rivers and lakes in the hot weather".
Children play in a bassin of the Trocadero Fountain during a heatwave in Paris on May 27, 2026. (Photo by JOEL SAGET / AFP)
Four teenagers have drowned in lakes in England since Sunday amid a heatwave, police said.
The school-age children drowned over a long weekend, including a public holiday on Monday, as temperatures soared to reach record-breaking levels near London this week.
In Lincolnshire in northeast England, a 15-year-old boy drowned Sunday, police said.
People sunbathe next to the Trocadero Fountain during a heatwave in Paris on May 27, 2026. (Photo by JOEL SAGET / AFP)
The father of the boy, named Declan Sawyer, issued a warning to other families about the dangers of children “playing near any rivers and lakes in the hot weather”.
A teenage girl was pronounced dead after being pulled out of the water Monday evening at a water park in Warwickshire in central England, police said.
In Yorkshire in the northeast, one boy drowned in a reservoir on Monday, and a 13-year-old boy’s body was recovered early Tuesday at a country park, police said.
‘Heat Dome’
A woman shields herself from the sun with an umbrella near one of the fountains in the Place de la Concorde during a heatwave in Paris on May 27, 2026. (Photo by JOEL SAGET / AFP)
People in western Europe turned to fans and fountains as they sweltered through a record-breaking heatwave on Tuesday, with temperatures set to soar even further.
Hit by a “heat dome” of warm air from northern Africa that is pushing the mercury well above normal levels for May, some Europeans even admitted they were considering getting air conditioning, in a region famously averse.
Baking in a bright London sun, 47-year-old Gurjit Gill, who works in banking, said he was happy to be going into work — because of the air con.
“I’m thinking about actually maybe getting an AC unit, because the bedrooms at nighttime are quite unbearable,” he told AFP.
A man cools off with a hose on the street amid a heat wave in the Guaratiba neighborhood of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on February 17, 2025. Photo by TERCIO TEIXEIRA / AFP
People across western Europe swarmed beaches, braved streets clutching handheld fans and umbrellas to fend off the sun, and went for a dip or splashed themselves wherever they could — including at Rome’s Barcaccia fountain and bubblers in the Jardin du Palais Royal in Paris.
The UK reported its hottest-ever day for May, at 35.1C at Kew Gardens, in southwest London — breaking a record of 34.8C set at the same location Monday — as a high-pressure system trapped warm air over western Europe.
In France, which also logged its hottest-ever May day Monday and then again on Tuesday, the weather agency said the heatwave could last through the week, predicting temperatures could go as high as 39C in some areas.
“We are not in an emergency situation,” Health Minister Stephanie Rist said, but added: “We need to be wary of these heatwaves, even if we’re starting to get used to them.”
Tennis fans in Paris baked in temperatures of 33C at the French Open, with players battling through heat that Norway’s Casper Ruud said left him feeling “like a zombie”.
