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SMOKING on bar and restaurant terraces is per mitted again in Mallorca. The Spanish govern ment this week approved a Royal Decree officially declaring the end of the Covid19 health crisis and therefore the lifting of all remaining restrictions. Smoking on terraces was banned in August 2020 and in most Spanish regions the prohibition ended in March last year. Not so the Valencia Re gion and the Balearic Is lands, where the former regional government de cided to maintain it until the central executive in troduced a new, more re strictive Antismoking Law that, among other mea sures, maintained bar and restaurant terraces as smokefree zones. However, the end of the Covid health crisis has come before the new law is approved, meaning that customers are now allowed to spark up again. The lifting of the restric tions also does away with the obligation to wear a face mask inside chemists, health centres, hospitals and other healthcare centres.
Smoking allowed.
SUNCREAM OR UMBRELLA
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MALLORCA • EUROWEEKLYNEWS.COM
HEATWAVE: This weekend is expected to be the first of the summer.
MALLORCA is bracing itself for the arrival of a sudden increase in temperatures this weekend. According to the State Weather Agency (Aemet), the mercury could climb up to 36ºC on Saturday and continue rising over the next few days until reach ing 38ºC or even 40ºC in what could be the first heatwave of the summer. But predictions suggest that it could feel even hot ter, as high levels of atmo spheric humidity could sig nificantly increase the ‘thermal sensation’. The temperature over the last couple of weeks has been up to two de grees higher than the nor
mal registers for the time of year, with the week end’s hot spell set to push the difference up to six or eight degrees. For it to officially count as a heatwave, thermome ters must stay above 36ºC for more than three con secutive days over a large area. According to the ‘meteo rological calendar’, sum mer officially started on June 1, but until this week the season had been con siderably different to past years with heavy rainfall registered throughout Spain and weather pat terns said to be more typi cal of autumn and even winter.
The Aemet reports that preliminary analyses sug gest that this could have been the second rainiest June of the 21st century so far in Spain. An average of 67 litres per square metre fell last month throughout the country, more than double the normal level of rainfall for June and second only to the same month in 2010, when 69 litres fell per square metre. Among the reasons sug gested by experts is the presence of the socalled ‘Scandinavian blockade’ between the UK and Scan dinavia that pushes atmo spheric instability through to lower latitudes.
FREE • GRATIS
House repair grants THE Housing department of the Balearic Islands Govern ment has extended the deadline for residents to ap ply for public grants to re store buildings and houses. Applications are now tak en until December 31 as op posed to September 1 as Restoration of houses. previously announced. The scheme has a total budget of €29.5 million and the grants are available to all owners or coowners of property who are over 18 years of age and are residing legally in the Balearic Islands. For further information visit www.caib.es
Image by the Balearic Islands Government
6 - 12 July 2023
Issue No. 1983