The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) has confirmed that a temperature of 38 degrees Celsius (100.4 degrees Fahrenheit) reached in a Siberian town last year was a record for the Arctic.

United Nations, December 16 (RHC)-- The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) has confirmed that a temperature of 38 degrees Celsius (100.4 degrees Fahrenheit) reached in a Siberian town last year was a record for the Arctic.

The United Nations’ agency said on Tuesday the temperature that hit Verkhoyansk on June 20, 2020, came during a prolonged heatwave amid conditions which averaged as much as 10C (50F) above normal for much of the summer over Arctic Siberia.  “This new Arctic record is one of a series of observations … that sound the alarm bells about our changing climate,” said Petteri Taalas, the WMO’s secretary-general.

Verkhoyansk is about 115 km (71 miles) north of the Arctic Circle – a region that is among the fastest warming in the world and is heating more than twice the global average.  The WMO said in a statement the 2020 heatwave “fuelled devastating fires, drove massive sea loss and played a major role” in last year being one of the three hottest years on record.   “It is possible, indeed likely, that greater extremes will occur in the Arctic region in the future,” it added.