Earth cooked to its hottest month on record in August, blowing far past a key climate threshold, due to the dangerous double whammy of human-caused climate change and a supersized El Nino, according to the European climate service Copernicus. August's sizzle also helped push the globe and the United States to swelter through the hottest Northern Hemisphere summer scientists have measured, the AP reports. Last month the world averaged 62.53 degrees Fahrenheit, which technically was one-hundredth of a degree Celsius more than the all-time global mark set in July 2023, but because that's also the uncertainty level, it's considered a tie, said Samantha Burgess, strategic climate lead for Copernicus.
Globally, August was 1.65 degrees Celsius (nearly 3 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels, far exceeding the longer term 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) threshold set by the 2015 Paris climate agreement. The eight hottest months on record have all been from July 2023 on, according to Copernicus data. Global monthly ocean temperatures in August tied a March 2024 all-time record for warmest month recorded, while Aug. 22 set a record for hottest day recorded in the world's seas, according to Copernicus.
The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on Wednesday announced that for the first time, summer in the Lower 48 states was hotter than during the peak of the devastating Dust Bowl in 1936. June through August of 2026 in the contiguous United States averaged 74.37 degrees Fahrenheit, nearly four tenths of a degree warmer than the mark set 90 years earlier. Globally, this past summer also tied, with 2024, for the hottest on record, according to Copernicus. In the US, August smashed heat records by more than half a degree Fahrenheit, averaging 75.58 degrees, and the average daytime high was a blistering 88.56 degrees, also a record. July was similarly record hot in the US, erasing another long-standing Dust Bowl mark.
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