Amber and yellow alerts for heatwave: Malaga heads into a week of scorching high temperatures

The hottest week of the year in the province is on its way. This is what Spain’s state weather agency (Aemet) is predicting for Malaga, where the amber level warning for high temperatures has been activated for the first time so far in 2023.

Maximum temperatures will exceed 40C this Monday 10 July, which translates into a “significant risk” in the Antequera and Ronda areas. The weather warnings will be active between 1pm and 9pm, and they have now been extended to Tuesday, 11 July. However, it has not been ruled out that they could be in place until Thursday.

Today, Aemet specifically forecasts maximum temperatures of 40 degrees in the Vega de Antequera and the Serranía de Ronda. Similar temperatures will be reached in parts of the upper Guadalhorce valley, such as Coín, Álora and Pizarra, although in this case the weather warning is not activated because the meteorological region is shared with the Costa del Sol, where the thermometers will not reach these extremes. In the case of the Axarquía, the warning level is yellow, for maximums of 37 degrees. In Malaga city and along the Costa del Sol it will reach 35.

On Tuesday, 11 July, the maximums will be even higher and will reach 41 degrees in Antequera and Ronda; while Malaga city, the Costa del Sol and the Guadalhorce areas have been put on a yellow alert notice, where 38C is expected from noon onwards. "Locally, 40 degrees may be exceeded in the towns of the Guadalhorce valley," warned Aemet. In the Axarquía, values ​​of 38-39 degrees (yellow alert level) are expected.

This week will "without a doubt" be the hottest of the year in Malaga, according to the director of the Aemet weather centre in the city, Jesús Riesco. "This time there is going to be a heatwave for Malaga with great probability," he added.

If it will be bad during the day, it won't be much better at night. The phenomenon of tropical nights is already a constant throughout the summer on the coast, "not dropping below 20 degrees is normal, climate change has seen to that." But the bad news is that this week the tropical nights will extend to the inland areas, with minimums of 25 degrees throughout the province during the night.

The third significant meteorological factor will be the haze this week, since the flow of air from the south of the Sahara will bring suspended dust, which can already be seen today in the skies of Malaga and it will increase; although since there are no showers forecast it will not cause muddy deposits. The effect of heat and the haze combining during the first half of the week will create a suffocating effect in the atmosphere.