August was Earth’s hottest month on file,…
Earth cooked to its hottest month on file in August, blowing far past a key climate threshold, due to the harmful double whammy of human-caused climate change and a supersized El Nino, according to the European climate service Copernicus.
August’s sizzle also helped push the globe and the United States to swelter through the hottest Northern Hemisphere summer season scientists have measured.
Last month the world averaged 62.53 levels Fahrenheit (16.96 levels Celsius), which technically was one-hundredth of a degree Celsius more than the all-time global mark set in July 2023, but because that’s also the uncertainty degree, it’s thought-about a tie, said Samantha Burgess, strategic climate lead for Copernicus.
August set a global heat file, capping the hottest Northern Hemisphere summer season ever recorded. Anadolu via Getty Images
“It is now time to stop acting surprised that our warming planet keeps getting warmer. This is occurring exactly as forecast by scientists literally decades ago,” Texas A&M University climate scientist Andrew Dessler said in an e-mail.
“The interesting question is not whether we will keep breaking heat records (we will), but whether we’re going to do anything about it or just stand there while the climate train runs us over.”
Globally, August was 1.65 levels Celsius (practically 3 levels Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial ranges, far exceeding the long term 1.5 levels Celsius (2.7 levels Fahrenheit) threshold set by the 2015 Paris climate settlement. The eight hottest months on file have all been from July 2023 on, according to Copernicus data.
“Our climate system is really operating well outside the range we would have expected just a decade ago,” Burgess said Wednesday from a United Kingdom that has been beset with heat waves.
“We’ve transitioned from climate being very abstract and perhaps impacting the global South or far away places to climate impacting and disrupting our daily lives with schools closing, hospitals being overwhelmed, roads melting, train lines buckling. And the reality is we will get more of these conditions that we’ve seen this summer.”
A map exhibiting US imply temperature percentiles across the nation in August 2026 NOAA
Global month-to-month ocean temperatures in August tied a March 2024 all-time file for warmest month recorded, while Aug. 22 set a file for hottest day recorded in the world’s seas, according to Copernicus.
An further sizzling summer season hits
“This summer has really been exceptional. We’ve seen records that existed for close to 100 years be broken, in the US in particular,” Burgess said.
The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on Wednesday announced that for the first time, summer season in the Lower 48 states was hotter than during the height of the devastating Dust Bowl in 1936.
June through August of 2026 in the contiguous United States averaged 74.37 levels (23.54 levels Celsius), practically 4 tenths of a degree hotter than the mark set 90 years earlier. Globally, this past summer season also tied, with 2024, for the hottest on file, according to Copernicus.
A Ventusky heat map exhibits temperatures across the world on Aug. 19, 2026. Ventusky
In the US, August smashed heat information by more than half a degree Fahrenheit, averaging 75.58 levels (24.21 levels Celsius) and the average daytime high was a blistering 88.56 levels (31.42 levels Celsius), also a file. July was equally file sizzling in the US, erasing another long-standing Dust Bowl mark.
That information are often getting damaged, and that August and not July which is historically hotter set an all-time file, are indicators that human-caused climate change is accelerating, Berkeley Earth climate scientist Zeke Hausfather said.
Copernicus data goes back to 1940. NOAA data for the United States goes back to 1895 and global data, which usually matches Copernicus data but takes longer to calculate, dates back to 1880.
Residents fill jerrycans and bottles with water from a natural spring in northern Tunisia on Aug. 26, 2026. MOHAMED MESSARA/EPA/Shutterstock
Fossil fuels, El Nino blamed
Several scientists said while El Nino is a issue, this natural and momentary warming of elements of the Pacific that warps and warms climate globally is nowhere as big a trigger as the heat-trapping gases emitted as people burn coal, oil and natural gasoline.
“While El Nino is starting to ramp up the heat, the underlying driver remains our relentless burning of fossil fuels. Climate change makes every El Nino hotter, and until we stop burning coal, oil, and gas these record-shattering months will simply keep on coming,” said Friederike Otto, a climate scientist at Imperial College London.
Burgess said El Nino usually provides only one or two tenths of a degree Celsius (two to 4 tenths Fahrenheit) to the global temperature with the overwhelming relaxation of the heat coming from the burning of fossil fuels.
A customer makes use of an umbrella to protect herself from the solar at Stonehenge, Britain on Aug. 13, 2026. REUTERS
This El Nino is forecast, however, to break information for strength in the approaching months.
And as temperatures continue to rise, heat waves, storms, floods and wildfires will get more frequent and more harmful, said Texas Tech climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe.
According to Hausfather, “it is increasingly likely that 2026 ends up beating 2024 as the warmest year on record, and almost certain that 2027 beats both, potentially reaching as high as 1.8 degrees Celsius (3.2 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial levels on the back of an unprecedentedly-strong El Nino event.”
Some days might hit an even greater climate threshold, 2 levels Celsius (3.6 levels Fahrenheit) above mid 1800s, Burgess said.
“Until humanity stops burning colossal amount of coal, oil and gas, the pollution this causes will keep baking our planet, and extreme heat will keep smashing all-time records, killing millions and costing trillions, hitting transport and health systems, and pushing up prices for household basics like food,” United Nations climate chief Simon Stiell said.
“This is the spiraling price of humanity’s fossil fuel addiction, and the global climate crisis it is fueling.”
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