The Met Office has officially confirmed that the UK experienced its hottest June on record.
With an average monthly temperature of 15.8 degrees Celsius, this surpassed the previous highest average June temperature from 1940 and 1976 by 0.9 degrees Celsius.
Scientists have attributed the increased likelihood of breaking the previous record to climate change, stating that it made the occurrence at least twice as probable.
Temperature records were broken in 72 out of the 97 areas in the UK where temperature data is collected. Furthermore, England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland all recorded their warmest June since the Met Office began collecting data in 1884.
“It’s officially the hottest June on record for the UK, for mean temperature as well as average maximum and minimum temperature,” said Met Office’s Climate Science Manager Mark McCarthy.
“An increase of 0.9C may not seem a huge amount, but it’s really significant because it has taken the average daytime and the night time temperature for the whole of the UK,” Paul Davies, Met Office Climate Extremes Principal Fellow and Chief Meteorologist, told BBC News.
“That’s significant in a warming climate and because of the consequential impacts on society,” he added.
In addition, the Met Office highlighted that the distinction in the hottest June on record was not solely based on a single high temperature, such as the 40.3 degrees Celsius reached last summer. Instead, the notable aspect of last month’s record-breaking June was the sustained heat experienced both during the day and night.
Furthermore, rainfall was significantly below average throughout much of the month, with only 68% of the typical June precipitation recorded. Wales, in particular, experienced exceptionally dry conditions, receiving just over half of its average monthly rainfall.
To assess the impact of climate change on the weather patterns, the Met Office utilized a powerful supercomputer to analyze the temperatures and identify the characteristic features associated with climate change.