The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) made an announcement that temperatures in July were the highest ever recorded on the planet.
Temperature records have been kept since 1880, but scientists believe that this could be the hottest records since the last 4,000 years. The average temperature of all locations across the globe was 61.86 degrees, higher than the previous peaks in July 2010 and July 2008. July is generally the hottest month in the whole year.
A large part of Central and Western Europe experienced extremely hot climes with several Austrian cities sweltering in the hottest period ever seen in its 249-year recorded climatic history. The United Kingdom and Germany also recorded hottest ever July in their history. In Africa, the average temperature this July was second only to the one recorded in July 2002. The US and portions of West Asia were a couple of the few regions which did not witness such intense heat. While the temperatures recorded in the US were higher than the July average, no peaks were breached in any state.
Bandar Mahshahr in Iran recorded the highest temperatures ever on earth on July 31. The air temperature recorded was 115 and when added to a dew point of 90 degrees, the city’s heat index reached a fuming 165 degrees, NOAA claimed.
Globally, the combined average temperatures over water and land surfaces for the month of July was 1.46 degrees more than the previous average of the 20th century which was 60.4 degrees, claimed the NOAA. This data matches with that issued by the Japan Meteorological Administration and NASA, earlier this week. The data from Japan and NASA also said that this year’s July temperatures beat the previous record of July 2011 by 0.36 degrees.
NOAA also claimed that last month was the 39th consecutive July and the 365th consecutive month when temperatures were above average. Jake Crouch, the climate scientist from NOAA, told the Associated Press that this year is likely to end up as the hottest year in the recorded history. He opined that the report is only reaffirming what we already know; the earth is warming up and it continues to warm up. Reasons for this year’s unprecedented increase in temperatures across the globe are attributed to the enhanced warming effect of El Nino combined with man-made effects on global warming.
NOAA also predicts that a strong El Nino is building up whose effect will be more than the intensity of the 1997 climate event which affected the weather drastically across the globe; from fires in Australia to mudslides in California. There is over 90% possibility that El Nino effects will persist throughout the winter of 2015-16 in the Northern Hemisphere and about 85% possibility it will persist into the spring of 2016 too, said an NOAA forecast.
