The entire planet would have had its unofficial hottest day on July 3, then shattered that record the next day, according to scientists from the University of Maine’s Climate Reanalyzer project.
On the day of July 4, the average air temperature on the surface of the planet was measured at 17.18 ° C by an organization dependent on the American Agency for Oceanic and Atmospheric Observation (NOAA), which n However, no official confirmation has yet been given for this day.
This measurement clearly exceeds the 17.01 ° C measured on Monday and which already beat by a significant margin the previous daily record (16.92 ° C) established on August 14, 2016 and repeated on July 24, 2022, according to this data produced by a model. from the National Centers for Environmental Prediction of NOAA, and put online by researchers from the University of Maine.
The University of Maine’s climate calculator — based on satellite data and computer simulations — predicts temperature in record territory with Antarctica averaging a whopping 4.5 degrees Celsius warmer than average between 1979 and 2000.
High temperature records were broken on July 3 and 4 in Quebec and in northwestern Canada and Peru. Cities across the United States, from Medford, Oregon, to Tampa, Florida, have reached unprecedented heights, said Zack Taylor, meteorologist with the National Weather Service. Beijing reported nine consecutive days last week when the temperature exceeded 35 degrees Celsius.
“The increasing warming of our planet caused by the use of fossil fuels is not unexpected, it was already predicted in the 19th century after all,” remarked climatologist Stefan Rahmstorf, from the Institute for Climate Research. from Potsdam in Germany.
“But it’s dangerous for us humans and for the ecosystems we depend on. We have to stop it quickly. »
This daily, but preliminary and unofficial, heat record comes after months of “really unreal weather and climate statistics for the year”, such as unusual heat in the North Atlantic, record-breaking sea ice in Antarctica and a rapid strengthening of El Niño, said Jason Furtado, professor of meteorology at the University of Oklahoma.
This world record is not quite the type regularly used by benchmark climate measurement entities like the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association. But it is an indication that climate change is reaching uncharted territory.
Scientists typically use much longer measurements — months, years, decades — to track the Earth’s warming. Moreover, this preliminary hottest day record is based on data only dating back to 1979, when satellite recording began, while NOAA data is from 1880.
With Agence France-Presse