Looking for tangible evidence of global warming? According to the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service, which studies temperature data from around the globe over time, this past month has been the hottest October on record, palpably indicating the world’s changing climate.
The EUCCCS’s records go back to 1979, and in their forty years of data, they have never had an October as hot as this year’s. 2019’s October was 0.69 degrees Celsius (1.24 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than the average for the EUCCCS’s data. It was .01 degrees Celsius (0.018 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than the previous warmest October, which took place in 2015.
Alongside October, 2019 also saw the hottest July on record, surpassing its 2016 predecessor. It was overall a record hot year. Each month in 2019 ranked among the top four hottest for the respective month. The past twelve years in total averaged 1.2 degrees Celsius (2.16 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than pre-industrial temperatures. This is particularly eerie considering that the Intergovernmental Panel On Climate Change recently released a warning about the catastrophic effects of temperatures rising 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) over pre-industrial levels.
It is also worth noting that all of the EUCCCS’s data is based on global averages. Thus, some areas of the world may have experienced a colder 2019 than average, but these are the outliers to the worldwide trend.
Of course, a 1.2 degrees temperature increase may not sound that alarming on the surface. However, this yearlong heat spike will actually have immense effects on climate change. The arctic ice will melt faster; wildfires will spread quicker; and biodiversity will diminish at accelerated rates. That is just to name a few of the ways such a small temperature boost might severely impact the planet if gone unchecked.