Italy tornado causes damage and destruction as fears over casualties grow

Twister strikes Gessate and Cernusco sul Naviglio areas of Milan

A tornado touched down in Italy causing damage and destruction, an Italian weather site said on Friday.

Several people were feared dead or injured after the tornado landed in Milan, but so far there have been no confirmed casualties, MeteoWeb reported.

The storm, accompanied by wind and hail, drenched the city's north-east, flooding parts of the city.

Footage shared on social media showed the twister ripping through an area north-east of the industrial and financial capital.

According to local media, wind speeds reached as high as 200 kilometres per hour and several people suffered serious injuries from falling debris.

It came after an intense hailstorm hit Venice on Wednesday as a wave of severe weather and heat covered the country, causing widespread damage and injuries.

More than 100 people were hurt by the hailstones, broken glass and falls after hailstones as large as lemons fell in the Veneto region.

Temperatures for southern Europe have threatened to break record highs all week.

The Italian island Sardinia hit 47°C on Wednesday, inching close to the record 48.8°C, set in Floridia, Sicily, in August 2021.

Southern Europe's second heatwave in as many weeks started on Thursday.

Greek firefighters have struggled to contain a wildfire west of Athens that has burnt forests for a fifth day.

The tornado that hit Milan. Tornado in Italia

Spain has also been hammered by the heatwave that pushed temperatures above 40°C.

Amador Cortes, a resident in the southern Spanish city of Jaen, said people were doing their best to avoid the sun around midday and the early afternoon.

A wildfire broke out on La Palma, one of the Canary Islands.

In the US, which has also experienced a heatwave, a Pfizer factory in Rocky Mount, North Carolina, was heavily damaged by a tornado, the drug maker said.

Heatwaves are expected to persist in a large part of the world throughout August, said an adviser on extreme heat, following on from record temperatures in recent weeks.

The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said earlier this week it expected temperatures in North America, Asia, North Africa and the Mediterranean to be above 40°C "for a prolonged number of days this week as the heatwave intensifies".

"We should expect or at least plan for these extreme heatwaves to continue through August," Senior Extreme Heat Advisor for the WMO John Nairn said.

"We're on trend in seeing a rise in global temperatures that will contribute to heatwaves increasing in intensity and frequency," Mr Nairn said.

"We've got quite clear indications that they're already growing out into spring."