Met Office

Earlier, the Met Office confirmed Thursday was the warmest start to May on record, with temperatures reaching 28C in London.

Technically, this is unlikely to meet the Met Office's criteria for a heatwave.

Defra and Met Office air pollution forecasts, external for the week shows moderate pollution levels quite widely across the UK by Wednesday, especially for England and Wales.

"We had an exceptionally dry and sunny March," said Will Lang, head of risk and resilience services at the Met Office.

A study led by the Met Office found that the extreme "fire weather" that helped spread the destructive blazes of July 2022 were made at least six times more likely by human-caused climate change.