Landsat 8 images from 21 July 2018 (left) and 16 September 2018 (right) illustrating the Taku Glacier transient snowline. The 21 July 2018 snowline is at 975 m and the 16 September 2018 snowline is at 1400 m. Average end-of-summer snowline is 975 m; the 2018 end-of-summer snowline was the highest observed in the 73-year record. Graphic: AMS

State of the Climate in 2018: 2018 was the fourth-hottest year on record, behind 2016, 2015, and 2017

12 August 2019 (NCEI) – A new State of the Climate report [pdf] confirmed that 2018 was the fourth warmest year in records dating to the mid-1800s. Last year was the fourth warmest year on record despite La Niña conditions early in the year and the lack of a short-term warming El Niño influence until […]

Flames consume a tree as wildfires rage in the Krasnoyarsk region of Siberia, 1 August 2019 Photo: The Siberian Times

Massive wildlife tragedy in Siberia as bears and foxes flee taiga, while smaller animals suffocate in smoke – “The climatic situation will deteriorate in Siberia”

By Svetlana Skarbo 1 August 2019 (The Siberian Times) – Predators seek food in villages all around Siberia as climate expert warns of worse fires each year due to soaring rise in temperatures, 10°C above average. Wild animals are turning to humans as they escape gas-chamber-like woods, with wildfires continuing to rage across almost 3 […]

Satellite views of the Okjökull glacier in Iceland in 1986 and 2019. Data: Landsat / U.S. Geological Survey. Photo: Joshua Stevens / NASA Earth Observatory

Okjökull glacier remembered

By Kathryn Hansen 9 August 2019 (NASA) – On 18 August 2019, scientists will be among those who gather for a memorial atop Ok volcano in west-central Iceland. The deceased being remembered is Okjökull—a once-iconic glacier that has melted away throughout the 20th century and was declared dead in 2014. A geological map from 1901 estimated Okjökull […]

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite captured an image of thick wildfire smoke swirling over the state on 8 July 2019. Meteorologists in Fairbanks reported visibility had dropped to less than one mile due to smoke, and air quality sensors in the city reported skyrocketing levels of particulates in the air. Photo: NASA Earth Observatory

Baked Alaska: State endures warmest month on record in July 2019

By Christopher C. Burt 9 August 2019 (Weather Underground) – July 2019 was the warmest month on record for the state of Alaska, smashing the previous record by almost one full degree Fahrenheit and leaving numerous local records for hottest day and warmest month in the superheated dust. Records for statewide average temperatures date back […]

Land surface temperature over Europe, 25 July 2019, measured by the Copernicus Sentinel3 satellite. Graphic: ESA

WMO: July 2019 equaled or surpassed hottest month globally – World is on track for the 2015-2019 period “to be the five hottest years on record”

1 August 2019 (WMO) – According to the new data from the World Meteorological Organization and Copernicus Climate Change Programme, July 2019 at least equalled, if not surpassed, the hottest month in recorded history. This follows the warmest ever June on record. The data from the Copernicus Climate Change Programme, run by the European Centre […]

Breakup of sea ice on the north coast of Greenland, 14-29 July 2019. Photo: Nick Humphrey / NASA Worldview

Siberia forest fires spark potential “disaster” for Arctic – 12 million hectares have burned in Russia this year – “The most important event on the planet right now? Arctic climate chaos.”

30 July 2019 (AFP) – Gigantic forest fires have regularly raged through the vast expanses of Russia’s Siberia, but the magnitude of this year’s blazes has reached an exceptional level with fears of a long-term impact on the environment. As fires sweep across millions of hectares enveloping entire cities in black smoke and noxious fumes, […]

Daily sea ice conventration analysis for 27 July 2019. Graphic: NWS Alaska Sea Ice Program

Record-breaking European heat wave heads north, massive melting likely in Arctic – “This actually primes things for more sea ice loss later, on the order of weeks”

By Bob Henson 29 July 2019 (Weather Underground) – Over the next few days, meltwater will cascade across the Greenland Ice Sheet, and sea ice will dissolve into the Arctic Ocean in amounts that could be unprecedented for late July and early August. The same air mass that led to the sharpest, hottest heat wave ever […]

A woman in Kirensk, near Irkutsk, Russia, wears a mask against pollution from nearby wildfires, 29 July 2019. Photo: The Siberian Times

Wildfires and floods rage through Siberia – 3 million hectares burning in Siberia and Russian Far East – Russia declares state of emergency – “Our children are suffocating”

29 July 2019 (The Siberian Times) – A series of natural disasters are hitting Siberia, with the latest a dire threat from severe flooding to Baikal – the oldest and deepest lake in the worth, containing 20% of the planet’s unfrozen freshwater. The alert concerns flooding in Baikalsk – where evacuation has begun – and […]

Wildfire at about 64°N in the Mirninsky District of the Sakha Republic, Russia, 22 July 2019. Photo: Copernicus Sentinel-2 / Pierre Markuse

More than 100 Arctic wildfires burn in worst-ever fire season – Smoke plumes from huge blazes in Greenland, Siberia, and Alaska visible from space – “These are some of the biggest fires on the planet, with a few appearing to be larger than 100,000 hectares”

By Edward Helmore 26 July 2019 (The Guardian) – The Arctic is suffering its worst wildfire season on record, with huge blazes in Greenland, Siberia, and Alaska producing plumes of smoke that can be seen from space. The Arctic region has recorded its hottest June ever. Since the start of that month, more than 100 wildfires have […]

A woman walks past a window reflecting a thermometer showing a temperature of 41 degrees Celsius on 25 July 2019, in Paris, as a new heatwave hits the French capital. Photo: Dominique Faget / AFP / Getty Images

All-time heat records melt in Europe – Paris warmer than Singapore at 42.6°C (108.7°F) – National records broken on Wednesday fell again on Thursday – “‘If you’d have said five years ago we’d see temperature records fall this frequently, I wouldn’t have believed you”

By William Wilkes and Megan Durisin 24 July 2019 (Bloomberg) – Europe’s latest summer heatwave broke heat records just weeks after the continent had its hottest ever June, fueling concern that a shifting climate is triggering more extreme weather. Germany probably set a new all-time temperature record of 42.6 degrees Celsius (108.7 Fahrenheit) in the […]

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