Last Sunday was Earth's hottest day in all recorded history, European climate agency says (2024)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — On Sunday, the Earth sizzled to the hottest day ever measured by humans, yet another heat record shattered in the past couple of years, according to the European climate service Copernicus Tuesday.

Copernicus’ preliminary data shows that the global average temperature Sunday was 17.09 degrees Celsius (62.76 degrees Fahrenheit), beating the record set just last year on July 6, 2023 by .01 degrees Celsius (.02 degrees Fahrenheit). Both Sunday’s mark and last year’s record obliterate the previous record of 16.8 degrees Celsius (62.24 degrees Fahrenheit), which itself was only a few years old, set in 2016.

Without human-caused climate change, records would be broken nowhere near as frequently, and new cold records would be set as often as hot ones.

“What is truly staggering is how large the difference is between the temperature of the last 13 months and the previous temperature records,” Copernius Director Carlo Buontempo said in a statement. “We are now in truly uncharted territory and as the climate keeps warming, we are bound to see new records being broken in future months and years.”

While 2024 has been extremely warm, what kicked Sunday into new territory was a way toastier than usual Antarctic winter, according to Copernicus. The same thing was happening on the southern continent last year when the record was set in early July.

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But it wasn’t just a warmer Antarctica on Sunday. Interior California baked with triple digit heat Fahrenheit, complicating more than two dozen fires in the U.S. West. At the same time, Europe sweltered through its own deadly heat wave.

“It’s certainly a worrying sign coming on the heels of 13 straight record -setting months,” said Berkeley Earth climate scientist Zeke Hausfather, who now estimates there’s a 92% chance that 2024 will beat 2023 as the warmest year on record.

July is generally the hottest month of the year globally, mostly because there is more land in the Northern hemisphere, so seasonal patterns there drive global temperatures.

Copernicus records go back to 1940, but other global measurements by the United States and United Kingdom governments go back even further, to 1880. Many scientists, taking those into consideration along with tree rings and ice cores, say last year’s record highs were the hottest the planet has been in about 120,000 years. Now the first six months of 2024 have broken even those.

Scientists blame the supercharged heat mostly on climate change from the burning of coal, oil and natural gas and on livestock agriculture. Other factors include a natural El Nino warming of the central Pacific Ocean, which has since ended. Reduced marine fuel pollution and possibly an undersea volcanic eruption are also causing some additional warmth, but those aren’t as important as greenhouse gases trapping heat, they said.

Because El Nino is likely to be soon replaced by a cooling La Nina, Hausfather said he would be surprised if 2024 sees any more monthly records, but the hot start of the year is still probably enough to make it warmer than last year.

Sure Sunday’s mark is notable but “what really kind of makes your eyeballs jump out” is how the last few years have been so much hotter than previous marks, said Northern Illinois University climate scientist Victor Gensini, who wasn’t part of the Copernicus team. “It’s certainly a fingerprint of climate change.”

University of Pennsylvania climate scientist Michael Mann said the difference between the this year’s and last year’s high mark is so tiny and so preliminary that he is surprised the European climate agency is promoting it.

“We should really never be comparing absolute temperatures for individual days,” Mann said in an email.

Yes, it’s a small difference, Gensini said in an interview, but there have been more than 30,500 days since Copernicus data started in 1940, and this is the hottest of all of them.

“What matters is this,” said Texas A&M University climate scientist Andrew Dessler. “The warming will continue as long as we’re dumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere and we have the technology to largely stop doing that today. What we lack is political will.”

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Read more of AP’s climate coverage at http://www.apnews.com/climate-and-environment

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The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

Last Sunday was Earth's hottest day in all recorded history, European climate agency says (2024)

FAQs

Last Sunday was Earth's hottest day in all recorded history, European climate agency says? ›

Copernicus' preliminary data shows that the global average temperature Sunday was 17.09 degrees Celsius (62.76 degrees Fahrenheit), beating the record set just last year on July 6, 2023 by . 01 degrees Celsius (. 02 degrees Fahrenheit).

Was last Sunday the hottest day on Earth? ›

WASHINGTON (AP) — On Sunday, the Earth sizzled to the hottest day ever measured by humans, yet another heat record shattered in the past couple of years, according to the European climate service Copernicus Tuesday.

What was the hottest day on Earth in history? ›

World: Highest Temperature
Record Value56.7°C (134°F)
Date of Record10 /7 [July] / 1913
Formal WMO ReviewYes (2010-2012)
Length of Record1911-present
InstrumentationRegulation Weather Bureau thermometer shelter using maximum thermometer graduated to 135°F
1 more row

What is the hottest day on Earth in 2024? ›

Goddard Digital Team

Daily global temperature values from July 1-July 23, 2024, from GEOS-FP are shown in purple. July 22, 2024, was the hottest day on record, according to a NASA analysis of global daily temperature data. July 21 and 23 of this year also exceeded the previous daily record, set in July 2023.

What was the hottest period ever on Earth? ›

Even after those first scorching millennia, however, the planet has often been much warmer than it is now. One of the warmest times was during the geologic period known as the Neoproterozoic, between 600 and 800 million years ago. Conditions were also frequently sweltering between 500 million and 250 million years ago.

What is the hottest day ever recorded in the United States? ›

Death Valley is famous as the hottest place on earth and driest place in North America. The world record highest air temperature of 134°F (57°C) was recorded at Furnace Creek on July 10, 1913.

Is July 2024 the hottest on record? ›

According to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, July 2024 was the warmest July on record for the globe in NOAA's 175-year record and 0.03°C (0.05°F) warmer than July 2023 and "more likely than not the warmest month on record for the globe since 1850."

How hot was Earth during the dinosaurs? ›

Very hot. During this Mesozoic Era — from about 250 to 66 million years ago — the concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere were around 16 times higher than now, creating a "greenhouse climate” with temperatures on average six to nine degrees warmer than today.

What is the highest recorded temperature in history? ›

Highest-ever temperature recorded in the world

The official record for the highest temperature is now 56.7°C (134°F), recorded on 10 July 1913 at Greenland Ranch, Death Valley, California, USA, according to Guinness World Records.

Which was the hottest year in human history? ›

The year 2023 was the warmest year since global records began in 1850 at 1.18°C (2.12°F) above the 20th-century average of 13.9°C (57.0°F).

What year will the earth be too hot? ›

The researchers said that 3 C is the best estimate of how much the planet will warm by 2100 if no action is taken. “Around the world, official strategies for adapting to the weather focus on temperature only,” Kong said. “But this research shows that humid heat is going to be a much bigger threat than dry heat.

How hot will the world be in 2050? ›

Since 1880, average global temperatures have increased by about 1 degrees Celsius (1.7° degrees Fahrenheit). Global temperature is projected to warm by about 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7° degrees Fahrenheit) by 2050 and 2-4 degrees Celsius (3.6-7.2 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100.

How hot will it get in 2030? ›

The study, published Jan. 30 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, provides new evidence that global warming is on track to reach 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial averages in the early 2030s, regardless of how much greenhouse gas emissions rise or fall in the coming decade.

What is the hottest thing ever recorded in history? ›

A CERN experiment at the Large Hadron Collider created the highest recorded temperature ever when it reached 9.9 trillion degrees Fahrenheit. The experiment was meant to make a primordial goop called a quark–gluon plasma behave like a frictionless fluid. That's more than 366,000 times hotter than the center of the Sun.

What is the hottest heat ever recorded on Earth? ›

The hottest temperature ever recorded on Earth was 134 F (56.67 C) in July 1913 at Furnace Creek, said Randy Ceverny of the World Meteorological Organization, the body recognized as keeper of world records.

Is it hotter than it was 100 years ago? ›

According to an ongoing temperature analysis led by scientists at NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), the average global temperature on Earth has increased by at least 1.1° Celsius (1.9° Fahrenheit) since 1880.

When was the last time the Earth was so hot? ›

Haustein said that the last time the Earth consistently reached temperatures seen this July was likely during the Eemian period, about 120,000 years ago. Although proper record-keeping began only in the 1800s, “we have paleoclimatic data, and they go back millions of years,” he said.

Why was Monday the hottest day on Earth? ›

Monday was likely the hottest day on Earth since at least 1940, according to European scientists, and surprisingly, Antarctica may be to blame. Temperatures soared to unprecedented heights this past Sunday and Monday on what may be the hottest day scientists have ever recorded.

Was the hottest day ever recorded on Monday? ›

Monday was hottest day ever measured by humans, beating Sunday, European science service says: "Uncharted territory" Monday was the hottest day ever measured by humans, beating a record set the day before, as countries across the globe continue to feel the heat, according to the European climate change service.

What is the hottest place on Earth ever recorded? ›

Death Valley holds the record for the highest air temperature on the planet: On 10 July 1913, temperatures at the aptly named Furnace Creek area in the California desert reached a blistering 56.7°C (134.1°F).

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