For the sixth month in a row, Earth set a new monthly record for heat, and also added the hottest autumn to the litany of record-breaking heat this year, the European climate agency calculated.
And with only one month left, 2023 is on the way to smashing the record for hottest year.
November was nearly a third of a degree Celsius (0.57 degrees Fahrenheit) hotter than the previous hottest November, the European Space Agency’s Copernicus Climate Change Service announced early Wednesday. November was 1.75 degrees Celsius (3.15 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than pre-industrial times, tying October and behind September, for the hottest above average for any month, the scientists said.
“The last half year has truly been shocking,” said Copernicus Deputy Director Samantha Burgess. “Scientists are running out of adjectives to describe this.’’
November averaged 14.22 degrees Celsius (57.6 degrees Fahrenheit), which is 0.85 degrees Celsius (1.5 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than the average the last 30 years. Two days during the month were 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than pre-industrial times, something that hadn’t happened before, according to Burgess.
So far this year is 1.46 degrees Celsius (2.6 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than pre-industrial times, about a seventh of a degree warmer than the previous warmest year of 2016, Copernicus scientists calculated. That’s very close to the international threshold the world set for climate change.
