Earth's record-breaking heat streak ends but climate threat remains
July 2024 narrowly misses being the hottest month on record, ending a 13-month streak as El Nino subsides, but experts warn that climate crisis' impact is far from over.
Copernicus warns climate crisis threat remains despite heat streak ending. / Photo: AP
Earth's string of 13 straight months with a new average heat record came to an end this past July as the natural El Nino climate pattern ebbed, the European climate agency Copernicus has announced.
But July 2024's average heat just missed surpassing the July of a year ago, and scientists said the end of the record-breaking streak changes nothing about the threat posed by climate crisis.
"The overall context hasn't changed," Copernicus deputy director Samantha Burgess said in a statement on Wednesday. "Our climate continues to warm."
Climate crisis drives extreme weather events that are wreaking havoc around the globe, with several examples just in recent weeks.
In Cape Town, South Africa, thousands were displaced by torrential rain, gale-force winds, flooding and more. A fatal landslide hit Indonesia’'s Sulawesi island. Beryl left a massive path of destruction as it set the record for the earliest Category 4 hurricane.
And Japanese authorities said more than 120 people died in record heat in Tokyo.
Those hot temperatures have been especially merciless.
July: 1.48C warmer
The globe for July 2024 averaged 62.4 degrees Fahrenheit (16.91 degrees Celsius), which is 1.2 degrees (0.68 Celsius) above the 30-year average for the month, according to Copernicus. Temperatures were a small fraction lower than the same period last year.
It is the second-warmest July and second-warmest of any month recorded in the agency's records, behind only July 2023. The Earth also had its two hottest days on record, on July 22 and July 23, each averaging about 62.9 degrees Fahrenheit (17.16 degrees Celsius).
During July, the world was 1.48 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer, by Copernicus' measurement, than pre-industrial times. That's close to the warming limit that nearly all the countries in the world agreed to in the 2015 Paris climate agreement: 1.5 degrees.
El Nino — which naturally warms the Pacific Ocean and changes weather across the globe — spurred the 13 months of record heat, said Copernicus senior climate scientist Julien Nicolas.
That has come to a close, hence July’s slight easing of temperatures. La Nina conditions — natural cooling — aren't expected until later in the year.
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