The Hottest Day of Your Life — So Far

Temperature records aren’t what they used to be. In the past, when a given area set some particular mark, they could usually enjoy it for a bit before seeing the record fall again. Not so much anymore.

On Sunday, the given area was the entire globe, and the particular mark was “warmest day in recorded history.”

The record stood until Monday.

According to preliminary data from the E.U.’s Copernicus Climate Change Service, the global average temperature has never been higher than those consecutive days. After more than a year straight of record-warm months, in the historically hottest month of the year, we all, collectively, just experienced the pinnacle of warming so far.

Of course, individuals don’t experience global averages. Instead, we get to enjoy the extreme heat waves and record-breaking days (and nights) that contribute to those smoothed out totals. Fairbanks, Alaska, was expected to possibly hit 90 degrees F this week. Spain has already sweltered through two extended heat waves this summer, and temperatures early next week could approach 115 degrees in some places. Eastern Europe is suffering through triple-digit heat as well; in Serbia, where Belgrade reached 104 degrees recently, the heat and drought led Lake Rusanda (pictured above) to dry up for the first time in recorded history. Las Vegas has seen its “most extreme heat wave in the history of record-keeping.” In India, 40,000 cases of suspected heat stroke have been reported since this summer began.

But that “pinnacle of warming” factoid is less important than the caveat — so far. There isn’t really a pinnacle here, not yet, not until emissions come down dramatically and some of the CO2 already up in the atmosphere starts to come down, with our help or without it. As July turns to August the global average temperature will dip, as it always does, and at some point, the string of record-breaking months will stop as well (meaning we’ll get the second- or third- or fourth-warmest September or November, not an actual below-average month). There may even be a year that dips down to fourth, or seventh, or ninth on the list of warmest years on record — maybe.

But the lines, in general, will keep going up. Next July will offer a new chance to break Sunday’s and Monday’s record days; if it doesn’t happen then, it will the following year, and probably again the year after that.