Heatwave Pushing 111F Shutters Schools In Southern Brazil
During historic floods last May that left more than 180 dead in Brazil’s southernmost state, Rio Grande do Sul, the water rose to the ceiling of the Olindo Flores school in the city of São Leopoldo, destroying furniture, books and parts of its infrastructure. When classes resumed more than a month later, its 500 students had to be relocated to another school for months.
On Monday, they were due to start the new school year but could not do so – this time because of an intense heatwave affecting the state. The start of the school year was pushed back after a court ruling on behalf of a teachers’ union, which had argued that classrooms lacked adequate ventilation and water supplies for students.
In recent days, the highest temperatures recorded in Brazilian cities have all been in Rio Grande do Sul, a state which is normally milder than other Brazilian regions closer to the equator. Quaraí, a city of 23,500 inhabitants on the border with Uruguay, recorded the country’s highest temperature of the year on 4 February: 43.8C (110.8F), with a heat index of over 50C – the highest ever recorded in the state since measurements began in 1910. More than 60 municipalities in the state have declared a state of emergency due to drought.
Marina Hirota, a scientist and professor of meteorology at the Federal University of Santa Catarina, said that while it was still too early for in-depth analyses of the current heatwave, both it and last year’s floods are “potentially linked to the climate crisis”. “These extreme events – heatwaves, cold spells, and intense flooding like what happened in Rio Grande do Sul in 2024, followed now by an extreme drought – are becoming more frequent and more intense … and this frequency and intensity are the result of the climate crisis,” she said.
EDIT
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/feb/12/brazil-record-heat-rio-grande-do-sul