Heavy flooding in the streets of Lavagna, Northern Italy.

Gulf Today Report

At least two people died by falling trees in central Italy as powerful storms hit several regions after weeks of extremely high temperatures, authorities said.

Italy's emergency services said that bad weather would spread south overnight and issued warnings for Friday for 11 of the country's 20 regions.

A man and a woman were crushed to death by trees in separate accidents in Tuscany, while four people were injured when a tree fell on a campsite in the same area.

The video showed a ferris wheel spinning uncontrollably in the Tuscan town of Piombino, with at least one of the metal canopy seats flying through the air.

No one was there at the time and no injuries were reported.

“A wave of devastation is hitting Tuscany,” region president Eugenio Giani said.

Farther north, strong winds tossed large bar umbrellas over St Piazza San Marco in Venice, while fragments of masonry have been washed away from the adjacent bell tower.

Winds blew over 140 km/h in parts of northern Italy, damaging resorts in Liguria and Tuscany, meteorologists said.

As rain and thunderstorms hit the north, much of southern Italy remained in the grip of a heatwave, with temperatures reaching nearly 40°C in parts of Sicily.

Firefighters extinguished a fire in the islet of Pantelleria, which had broken out on Wednesday and forced dozens of people, including designer Giorgio Armani, to flee their homes overnight.