July at par with hottest month in recorded history: WMO

GENEVA: World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) has released its latest weather data which shows that the month of July this year, which was preceded by the recorded hottest month June, was “at least equaled, if not surpassed, the hottest month in recorded history.”

Antonio Guterres, the UN chief, on August 1, informed reporters that “This is even more significant because the previous hottest month, July 2016, occurred during one of the strongest El Nino’s ever,” which was not the case this year. El Nino is a natural warming of the ocean that once it interacts with the atmosphere often warms up the globe and changes rainfall and temperature patterns, making some places wetter and some places drier, temporarily changing the climatic conditions of the region.

Guterres also informed that world is well on its way to record the hottest five years in recorded history, a claim which is well supported by latest weather data.

He warned that if all nations didn’t take immediate action to tackle climate change, extreme weather events happening now “are just the tip of the iceberg”. “And the iceberg is also rapidly melting,” said Guterres.

He added that Arctic Sea ice is already near record low levels and the European heat wave last month had raised temperatures in the Arctic and Greenland by 10 to 15 degrees Celsius.