July 2019 Was Officially The Hottest Month Ever Recorded In History
July 2019 was officially the hottest month ever recorded in human history, a European Union climate agency said on Monday (August 5).
After the United Nations said last week that it appeared July would at least match if not exceed the previous record for the hottest month, the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service released data on Monday (August 5) showing that July 2019 indeed broke the record, The Washington Post reports.
The previous record for hottest month in recorded history was July 2016, but the Copernicus Climate Change Service data indicated that last month slightly beat it, although the agency noted that it did so “by a margin that is small compared with the typical differences between datasets for previous Julys.” The month was “0.56°C warmer than the average July from 1981-2010,” the agency also said. The Post reports that NASA will still need to report its data in the coming weeks.
The results still must be checked against observational records gathered from networks of thousands of temperature measuring sites around the world. Those readings ultimately will be reported by NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and other agencies in the coming weeks. But the final results are not likely to differ significantly from Copernicus, according to scientists.
Last week, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said the period of 2015 through 2019 is on pace to be the hottest five-year period in recorded history, warning about the “climate emergency.”
From scorching heat in Europe to gargantuan wildfires in Siberia and Alaska, the record heat of July 2019 left its mark on people and the ecosystems they depend on.
The monthly temperature spike was driven largely by record warmth in Western Europe, including the searing heatwave that made its way to the Arctic and culminated in one of the most significant melt events ever recorded in Greenland. The Greenland ice sheet poured 197 billion tons of water into the North Atlantic in July alone — enough to raise global sea levels by 0.5 millimeters, or 0.02 inches.
Alaska also saw its warmest month on record. There and elsewhere across the Arctic, simultaneous and massive wildfires erupted, consuming millions of acres and emitting startling amounts of greenhouse gases. Arctic sea ice was at a record low for the month.
“Preventing irreversible climate disruption is the race of our lives and for our lives,” Guterres said. “It is a race we can — and must — win.”