The Earth Just Can't Stop Setting Heat Records

Coming In Hot

It's too early to say if 2024 will top last year as the hottest on record — but it will already go down in history for blowing past another damning heat metric.

As The Guardian reports, an unprecedented 15 national temperature records from countries around the globe have been broken since January. Monthly national temperature records, meanwhile, have been broken a whopping 130 times, with tens of thousands of monitoring stations worldwide observing all-time local highs.

This is according to data gathered by climatologist Maximiliano Herrera, who maintains an online database of extreme temperatures.

"This amount of extreme heat events is beyond anything ever seen or even thought possible before," Herrera told The Guardian. "The months from February 2024 to July 2024 have been the most record-breaking for every statistic."

Hell on Earth

The hottest temperatures have descended on the tropics, where heat records were broken every day for 15 months in a row, Herrera said. Egypt recorded a national high of 123.6 degrees Fahrenheit in June, while just two days before, Chad tied its record of 118.4 degrees.

Just north of the Tropic of Cancer, Mexico also matched its record of 125.6 degrees later that month. Other countries that either tied or broke heat ceilings include Costa Rica, Laos, Ghana, and Cambodia. Extraordinarily, the Cocos Islands in the eastern Indian Ocean near Australia equaled its all-time high of 91 degrees twice this year: once in February, and again in April.

It's no wonder, then, that this July was also the hottest in history — and so has every month since June of last year, making it 14 record months in a row.

And in yet another hot streak: many scientists, including those at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, say we're on track for 2024 to be the hottest year ever recorded, which would make an ominous double-header with last year.

Summer Is Coming

Summer heat waves that scourged cities around the globe are believed to have killed hundreds of people this year, Reuters reported — if not thousands.

Scientists fear that if temperatures continue to climb, the extreme climate will render vast amounts of land uninhabitable, which could displace billions of people.

This recent spate of record-setting heat has heightened attention on the issue. But, even if the streak ends, "we are bound to see new records being broken as the climate continues to warm," Carlo Buontempo, director of the European Union's Copernicus Climate Change Service, told The Guardian. "This is inevitable unless we stop adding greenhouse gases into the atmosphere and the oceans."

Until that happens, Herrera said that extreme weather alerts could save lives amidst our ever-hotter climate.

More on extreme heat: Dozens of Americans Die in Brutal Heat Wave

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