Climate graphic of the week: Global heat records alarm scientists

Obtain free Local weather change updates

The Earth reached its highest every day temperature since data started in 1979 for 4 consecutive days this week, unofficial knowledge confirmed, as local weather change and the El Niño phenomenon brought about excessive climate around the globe.

US authorities knowledge compiled by the College of Maine confirmed common world temperature broke a document to succeed in 17.01C, earlier than temperatures crested to a brand new excessive of 17.18C on Tuesday and Wednesday, and 17.23C on Thursday. The earlier document was set on August 14, 2016.

The College of Maine’s Local weather Reanalyzer software makes use of satellite tv for pc knowledge and pc simulations to supply a real-time snapshot of world temperatures. Nevertheless, the temperature readings aren’t formally accepted by the US authorities’s Nationwide Oceanic and Atmospheric Affiliation.

NOAA solely tracks and validates world temperature data on a month-to-month and annual foundation however not a every day foundation, and stated it couldn’t verify the conclusions by College of Maine scientists a couple of new world temperature document being set on July 3 and 4, 2023.

Nevertheless it added: “We recognise that we’re in a heat interval as a consequence of local weather change, and mixed with El Niño and scorching summer time circumstances, we’re seeing document heat floor temperatures being recorded at many places throughout the globe.”

On the similar time, scientists on the European statement company, Copernicus Local weather Change Service, formally confirmed that final month was the warmest June globally on document. Temperatures rose by a comparatively massive margin of 0.5C above the 1991-2020 common.

In June, meteorological bureaus around the globe introduced the return of El Niño, a phenomenon related to warming throughout the Pacific Ocean, although scientists have questioned whether or not the sample would have such an instantaneous affect on atmospheric temperatures. 

The temperature readings come as oceans attain traditionally heat ranges, and ice round Antarctica hits document lows for this time of 12 months. The world’s oceans reached document excessive temperatures for 2 months working over April and Might, in accordance with NOAA.

You might be seeing a snapshot of an interactive graphic. That is probably as a consequence of being offline or JavaScript being disabled in your browser.


Document June temperatures had been registered throughout north-west Europe, whereas elements of the US, Mexico, Asia and japanese Australia had been “considerably” hotter than traditional, Copernicus stated.

Antarctic sea ice reached its lowest extent for June since satellite tv for pc observations started, it discovered. Sea floor temperatures globally had been larger than any earlier June on document, with heat sea floor temperatures recorded within the north Atlantic.

Carlo Buontempo, director of Copernicus, stated the El Niño impact and local weather change had been combining to spice up temperatures.

“Given the warming pattern, what would have been an excessive however perhaps not a record-breaking excessive turns into record-breaking as a result of your entire local weather system is way hotter than it was even 10 years in the past,” stated Buontempo.

“We haven’t seen something like this in our historical past. And for me this can be a tangible instance of what it means to be working in uncharted territory. Local weather change shouldn’t be one thing that’s going to occur in 20 or 30 years’ time, it’s occurring now.”

Scientists have individually warned that warming oceans had been affecting the wave patterns of the jet stream, a band of fast-moving air excessive within the environment.

A security guard in Beijing wearing an electric fan on his neck
A safety guard in Beijing carrying an electrical fan on his neck. Scorching summer time warmth brought about native authorities to cease outside work © AP

This week from Beijing to Baghdad, swaths of Asia and the Center East had been with excessive temperatures.

Employers in Beijing on Thursday had been ordered by the federal government to cease outside work after scorching summer time warmth within the Chinese language capital was forecast to succeed in 40C.

A heatwave that has lasted a number of weeks in massive areas prompted some native authorities to name for curbs to enterprise and residential energy use as demand for cooling surged in some areas, whereas elements of central China noticed hundreds of individuals displaced by flooding.

Weakening, slower shifting and bigger waves have additionally been trapping warmth over pockets of the US. Final week greater than 110mn People had been dealing with excessive warmth, whereas no less than 100 individuals are estimated to have died in Mexico the place temperatures got here near 50C.

Local weather Capital

The place local weather change meets enterprise, markets and politics. Discover the FT’s protection right here.

Are you interested in the FT’s environmental sustainability commitments? Discover out extra about our science-based targets right here

Back To Top