by James KanterHerald TribunePARIS: Whatever happened to spring? Wherever it has gone, few people seem to be complaining - for now.
Café owners with outdoor terraces are among those who have been taking advantage of unseasonably warm weather across many parts of Western Europe. Evelyne Nataf, 56, whose restaurant serves crepes, has been earning several hundred extra euros at lunchtime by squeezing tables and chairs into a sunny alcove.
"I've never seen such good weather so early," said Nataf, who barely had time to pause to chat while hurriedly laying tables Thursday morning. The conditions "probably are a bad thing for the planet but they're definitely a good thing for us," she said.
Since the start of April, the temperatures and dryness have set records in parts of France and Germany. Large swaths of northern France have been so cloudless, there have been about 11 hours of sunshine a day for the last few weeks, nearly double the usual amount.
There also has been a lack of rain in Italy, the Netherlands and Britain, prompting tourists and locals alike to spend more of their time and money dining outdoors and buying supplies for barbecues and picnics.
"We have this attitude of going out and enjoying the weather when we're having a nice fall, a nice winter and a nice spring," said Stéphane Hallegatte, who participates in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a UN agency. But look out for summer, he warned.
"Four seasons of warm weather in a row can create quite a shock to our ecosystem," said Hallegatte, who is also a researcher at the International Center for Research on the Environment and Development in France. He foresees restrictions on water use and a growing likelihood of infestations by insects and pests.
Frédéric Nathan, a forecaster with Météo France, the national weather agency, attributed the current phenomena in part to a weather system in Eastern Europe and warm air from North Africa - conditions that are expected to continue through the weekend.
But "there also is the factor of global warming," said Nathan, who added that this month would probably be the warmest April on record in France.
"We've had an exceptionally warm month with temperatures more than 10 degrees above the seasonal averages, and we expect the next three months to be above normal," he said.
There was barely a drop of rain in some parts of France during much of April, something that is "very, very rare," Nathan said.
British forecasters also say April is very likely to set a new record in terms of highest mean temperature. They predict the heat to continue. "Signals for the rest of the summer indicate another warmer than average summer," said Barry Grommet, a press officer at the Met Office.
He cited dry, warm air from the Continent rather than climate change. Even so, recent trends "continue upwards, which reinforces the concept of warming climate," he said.
Globally, the five warmest years ever recorded have been within the past decade, with 2005 setting the record, said Hallegatte, who added that there was ample evidence that climate change was under way.
While April in cities like Paris has rarely been so lovely, unease about the warmth is growing.
Prime Minister Romano Prodi of Italy is scheduled to meet his cabinet next week to discuss emergency measures - and possibly declare a state of emergency - to free up aid to deal with a drought after northern Italy and pockets of central Italy experienced record-setting heat in April.
Luca Cordera di Montezomolo, the chairman of the Italian employers association Confindustria, has warned that the dry conditions could cause the closure of several factories.
In Germany, the Wednesday edition of the newspaper Bild carried a front-page headline predicting a "Sahara summer."
Temperatures of 30 degrees Celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit) are predicted in some regions, including Frankfurt this weekend, and the German weather service is "quite certain" April will be the warmest, sunniest and driest since 1901, when weather monitoring began.
In a sign of changes under way in Europe, clement conditions have led people to experiment with vineyards and olive groves in parts of Devon and Cornwall in Britain.
Guy Gagen, the chief crops adviser for the National Farmers Union, said there was plenty of rainfall over the winter in Britain and that oil seed rape, the third biggest crop grown in Britain, was flowering two weeks earlier than usual and might yield a better harvest because of the sunnier weather.
But even as some farmers prosper, others will probably suffer - including commuters on the overcrowded and under-ventilated Underground trains in London.
"This summer, if the weather is as hot as some are predicting, it will be difficult down there," said Peter Maclennan of Transport for London.
None of the Underground trains in London is scheduled to be air-conditioned until 2009, he said.
Catherine Gildea, who works in London in public relations, said she was enjoying the better weather for now, but felt apprehensive. "Everywhere looks nice," she said. But "in the back of my mind there is a feeling that it's just not right."
Hot weather has a macabre history in France, where extreme heat in August 2003 led to 14,802 more deaths than usual for that time of year, prompting a wave of self-recrimination both among families who lost elderly relatives and the medical authorities who were accused of being unprepared for the crisis. Many more deaths than usual also occurred elsewhere in Western Europe.
Karine Léger, a spokeswoman for Airparif, an independent agency that tracks pollution levels in and around Paris, said the sunshine and heat were exacerbating the effects of tailpipe fumes and other emissions, and could trigger respiratory and eye conditions and other disorders.
Airparif issued its earliest ever ozone-alert this year, on April 15, beating a record of May 30, which was set in 2003.
With reporting by Pamela Kent in London, Peter Kiefer in Rome and Sarah Plass in Frankfurt.
