Sunday hottest day since the start of the last ice age, scientists say

Sunday was the hottest day ever recorded on Earth  — breaking the previous record set last July.

Copernicus Climate Change Service, the European Union’s climate monitor, recorded the temperature on Sunday to be an average of 62.76 degrees Fahrenheit. The service has been recording the Earth’s temperature since 1940.

The recent development comes as the planet has experienced 13 months of record-setting temperatures.

“We are in truly uncharted territory,” Copernicus Director Carlo Buontempo said in a statement. “And as the climate keeps warming, we are bound to see records being broken in future months and years.”

Scientists say Sunday’s temperature record was statistically indistinguishable from the recorded temperature in 2023. However, scientists found that in the past year, the average global temperature exceeded the previous high of 62.24, set in August 2016, by 57 days. 

“What is truly staggering is how large the difference is between the temperature of the last 13 months and the previous temperature records,” Buontempo said.

The National Centers for Environmental Information found that 550 places around the planet set records for high daily temperatures in the last seven days, according to the Washington Post.

Sunday’s temperature coincided with wildfires that broke out in the northwestern United States, and temperatures around large parts of Antarctica were about 22 degrees above normal. 

The average temperature for the year so far is predicted to exceed 2.7 degrees above pre-industrial levels — which has frightened scientists.

Scientists have gone so far as to say Sunday was the hottest day on Earth since the start of the last ice age over 100,000 years ago. They based this finding on research by paleoclimate scientists who examined tree rings, ice cores, and lake sediments and found that current temperatures would not have been possible over the past 100,000 years. 

Some climate scientists are pointing the blame for rising temperatures on humans. Researcher Peter Thorne found in an Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report that human beings were responsible for all observed rises in temperatures since the 1850s. To mitigate the damage caused by rising temperatures, the IPCC is calling for steep cuts for fossil fuels to reach net zero emissions by 2050.