The NOAA (United States Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) designated Monday, July 3, as the new world record for the day with the highest average global temperatures recorded to date, with the symbolic barrier of 17 being exceeded for the first time. ºC (17.01 ºC, exactly).
Now, the Institute of Climate Change of the University of Maine (United States) has confirmed this mark, but has then warned that Monday’s record has been surpassed by the double maximum of July 4 and 5, in the that 17.18 ºC were reached, with a deviation of 0.97 ºC with respect to the average temperature for these dates in the climatic record (reference period, 1979-2000).
Graph from University of Maine Climate Change Institute shows time series and map visualizations of mean daily air temperature at 2 meters from the surface, from NCEP Climate Forecast System (CFS) version 2 (April 2011 – present) and CFS Reanalysis (January 1979 – March 2011). CFS/CFSR is a climate/weather numerical modeling framework that ingests surface, radiosonde, and satellite observations to estimate the state of the atmosphere with hourly resolution forward from January 1, 1979.
The combination of the new episode of the El Niño phenomenon, now recognized even by the World Meteorological Organization, and the advance of climate change has led to warnings from scientists who have predicted this as one of the hottest years on record.
In early June, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) had signaled the onset of El Niño, a weather phenomenon linked to rising temperatures in the equatorial eastern Pacific Ocean.
According to NOAA, the El Niño effect could cause a rainy summer in the southern United States and along the Gulf of Mexico coast.
Robert Rohde, of Berkeley Earth at the University of California, said in a tweet that “this combination could well bring even hotter days over the next six weeks.” Rohde, in addition, has indicated that the abnormally high temperature in the waters of the North Atlantic is maintained, in an escalation that has been observed for weeks.
In the same sense, the Climate Change Service of the Copernicus program (C3S), implemented by the European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts on behalf of the European Commission with EU funds, has recalled that during May 2023, temperatures Global sea surface temperatures were higher than any previous May, a trend that continued into June, and the global ocean experienced higher sea surface temperatures than any previous June on record.
By June 2023, Copernicus highlights these key points:
• The global ocean experienced higher sea surface temperatures than any previous June on record.
• Exceptionally warm sea surface temperature anomalies have been recorded in the North Atlantic, caused by a combination of short-term anomalous circulation in the atmosphere and long-term changes in the ocean.
• Extreme marine heat waves were observed around Ireland, the UK and the Baltic Sea.
• El Niño continued to strengthen over the eastern tropical Pacific.
According to Carlo Buontempo, Director of the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S): “These exceptional conditions in the North Atlantic highlight the complexity of the Earth system and remind us of the importance of monitoring global climate in near real time. The interplay between variability local and global together with climate trends is essential to better manage risks and design efficient adaptation policies.
