If your brow seemed damper than normal in June, you certainly weren’t alone. Many heavily populated locations, including parts of the United States and Europe, were hit by an extreme heat wave that saw temperatures reach record levels in multiple places. According to a report by CNN, this past month was the hottest June ever recorded in Europe, with average temperatures hitting 1°C over the prior record for the month, set in June of 1999.
Photo: Darren Green/Shutterstock
Heatwave Results in Hottest June Ever in the History in Europe
The cause of the heatwave was hot air blowing in from the Sahara Desert, which covered much of the European Union in the record heat for about one week. While not as extensive as the 2018 heatwave that hit the continent from April to December last year, for Europeans and those visiting the continent on summer trips, it was a hot month no matter how you look at it.
Copernicus Climate Change Service, which studies weather patterns and monitors the impact of climate change across the EU, also said that “the global-average temperature for June 2019 was also the highest on record for the month.”
Because of the “greenhouse effect” of methane and carbon dioxide, exacerbated by excessive use of fossil fuels across the planet, heat is trapped in the Earth’s atmosphere, causing increasingly hotter temperatures. “Although it is difficult to directly attribute this heatwave to climate change, such extreme weather events are expected to become more common as the planet continues to warm under increasing greenhouse gas concentrations,” the Copernicus Climate Change Service said. 
H/T: CNN