lines 08August
Most Europe heat records toppled in last 14 years
Air temperature measurements in Europe date back to the late 19th century and thus we have over a hundred years worth of extreme heat recordings. Our heatmap shows, among other things, that the difference between the warmest temperature in Iceland and Greece differ by a whopping 18°C, while over half of the maximum temperatures have been recorded just recently.
The coolest European heat record comes from Iceland, which, despite it's chilly name, still managed to witness 30.5°C heat (back in 1939, though). That's fairly understandable, considering Iceland's in the middle of a cool ocean way up north. It's slightly more surprising that Ireland and Estonia are the second and third coolest, respectively, while they are hardly the most northernly of countries in Europe.
A trend of increasing weather extremities has been noticed starting from the 1950s and many link this with global warming. There does seem to be a correlation because of the 39 countries in this map, 20 have had their record heat measured within the past 14 years.
The most recent UN IPCC report claims it's "extremely likely" (95-100%) that human influence has been the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century. Let's hope extreme measures to cut down on our global carbon footprint prevail extreme heat!
Take a look at the heatmap below: