September 6, 2023—If you’ve been feeling especially warm this Summer and not quite able to cool down, there’s a reason: It’s been a hot one. In fact, the June through August Summer season, otherwise known as the “boreal summer,” was the warmest on record, according to the Copernicus Climate Change Service of the European Union.
Copernicus found that the average global temperature in June-July-August was 16.77°C, or 62.18°Fahrenheit. That’s 0.66°C above average, the center says. (Note, that is a global average including the Southern Hemisphere, which is in the Winter season.) From January through August 2023 ranks the second warmest year on record, just shy of the hottest first eight-month average that happened in 2016.
Southern Europe, the southern United States, and Japan witnessed heatwaves while Arctic and Antarctic sea ice remained below average, according to the bulletin released by the center.
