More than 400 weather stations around the world beat their all-time highest temperature records in 2021, according to a climatologist who has been compiling weather records for over 30 years.
And, as is now the norm, several heat records have been broken, according to Herrera, with 10 countries – Oman, UAE, Canada, the United States, Morocco, Turkey, Taiwan, Italy, Tunisia and Dominica – breaking or tying their national highest record. 107 countries beat monthly high temperature records, while five countries beat a monthly low temperature record.
A few continental and planetary records fell too: Africa had its warmest June and September ever. August brought 48.8C (119.8F) in Syracuse, Italy, the highest temperature ever recorded in Europe. July had already brought 54.4C (130F) in Furnace Creek in the US’s Death Valley – the highest reliably recorded temperature on Earth. (A temperature recorded as 129.9F in 2020 was also rounded up to 130F.)
But there were a few specific events that particularly stood out for experts. For meteorologist Patricia Nying’uro, a co-founder of Climate Without Borders and based at the Kenyan Meteorological Department, the two consecutive failed rain seasons in Kenya were unusual, and forced the government to organise for food aid for the first time in many years.
He also highlighted the heat in Alaska in December, where a number of records were broken by a large margin. “That was extraordinary.”
China experienced its hottest ever year, according to the China Meteorological Administration. But it was the rain that hit the central province of Henan that really shocked: the region was hit by more rain in three days than it normally receives in an entire year. Hundreds died, crops and homes were destroyed, and the cleanup continues. Jia Xiaolong, deputy head of the National Climate Centre, said the situation last year had been abnormal.
I think many of us suspected that would be the outcome
