Seas outside the polar regions have never been as warm as in October, and Copernicus sees 2026 joining 2024 above 1.5 degrees
Last month the world was 1.75 degrees warmer than in the late nineteenth century, and Europe had its second-warmest October.
The global average temperature in October was 15.35 degrees Celsius, 1.75 degrees above the October average for the second half of the nineteenth century. That is according to figures from the European climate service Copernicus reported on Friday by Weeronline and Newsmonkey. According to Newsmonkey it was the warmest October on record, and it was the third month in a row above 1.5 degrees of warming. Copernicus considers it very likely that 2026 will become, after 2024, the second year in which average warming exceeds 1.5 degrees.
The average sea surface temperature outside the polar regions reached 20.95 degrees, an unprecedented level. Samantha Burgess of the European weather centre ECMWF points to a strong El Niño adding extra heat to a climate already warmed by human activity. In Europe it was the second-warmest October since records began, behind only 2022, with particularly high temperatures in Eastern Europe and Scandinavia, Weeronline reports.
Newsmonkey also describes last month's extremes: drought in Central and Eastern Europe with low water levels on the Danube and Rhine, and heavy rain and flooding in countries including Turkey, Greece, Spain and the United Kingdom. The Paris climate goal is measured as a thirty-year average and has therefore not yet formally been breached, but the UN Environment Programme UNEP says it is no longer realistic. The figures come just before the COP31 climate summit in Antalya, Turkey.