World’s hottest day: Scientists label July 3rd was the world’s hottest day ever
Data from the US government’s National Center for Environmental Predictions shows that the world crossed another grim milestone on Monday (July 3). The average global temperature on this day reached 17.01 °C (62.62 Fahrenheit), higher than the previous maximum of 16.92 °C (62.46 Fahrenheit) recorded in August 2016.
“This is not a milestone we should celebrate, it is a death sentence for people and ecosystems,” Friederike Otto, senior lecturer in climate science at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment, said in his remarks adding that ‘And the matter of concern is that it will not be the hottest day for a long time.’
The data showed that the new temperature record was about 0.8°C warmer than the average for the year between 1979-2000. Experts have attributed the increase in temperature to the climate crisis, which combined with the El Niño weather pattern, has been caused by the burning of fossil fuels and other human activities.
Otto said, ‘Because of the development of El Nino, the world will probably break this record again in the coming months. We absolutely need to stop burning fossil fuels.’
2023 could be the hottest year ever
After June’s highest temperatures, July is on track to be the warmest on record, Zeke Hausfather, Stripe’s head of climate research and research scientist at Berkeley Earth, said in a statement. “June was the hottest June ever recorded by a wide margin and July is also on track to be the hottest July on record,” he said. Based on the first six months of the year, it is increasingly likely that 2023 will end up as the warmest year overall.
