July becomes hottest month ever recorded
What's the story
European Union's climate change service Copernicus has declared that July 2023 broke the record for the hottest month ever measured on Earth.
It said that it had outperformed the previous record from July 2019 by 0.33 degrees Celsius.
According to Copernicus, last month was 0.72 degrees Celsius warmer than the average temperature recorded for July over the period from 1991 to 2020.
Ocean temperature
Ocean temperatures broke temperature records as well
The report stated that the global average sea surface temperatures also reached record highs in July.
Concerns regarding potential repercussions on the climate, marine life, and coastal towns have been raised as a result of this record-breaking temperature.
According to data from the European Union's climate observatory, the temperature of the ocean's surface increased to 20.96 degrees Celsius on July 30.
Extreme heat
Temperatures were the warmest in 120,000 years
An earlier report by Copernicus Climate Change Service and the World Meteorological Organization stated that the heat in July has been so extreme that it will break records "by a significant margin."
Based on millennia of climate data collected from tree rings, coral reefs, and deep-sea sediment cores, scientists are nearly certain that these temperatures mark the warmest period in the last 120,000 years.
Global warming
Rise in global temperature
The use of fossil fuels has contributed to an increase in global temperature of about 1.2 degrees Celsius since the late 1800s, which has increased heatwave length, intensity, and frequency.
The Antarctic Sea ice extent fell to its lowest level ever in July as a result of the record heat brought on by climate change, the data stated.
Heat domes experienced
Heat domes were experienced across
Asia, southern Europe, northern Africa, North America, and a large portion of the tropics, including the Caribbean, were all affected by a rash of violent heat domes, zones of high pressure that were dispersed across the northern hemisphere.
Well-above-average heat was seen on multiple occasions even in the southern hemisphere, particularly around Antarctica even during winter months, Copernicus observed.
July 6
July 6 was the hottest day
According to the Copernicus data, July 6 was the hottest day, with a global average temperature of 17.08 degrees Celsius.
Compared to prior averages of the first 23 days of July since 1940, the first three weeks of July 2023 were the warmest on record.
The surface air temperature reached 16.95 degrees Celsius, breaking the previous record of 16.63 degrees Celsius for July 2019.