The United Nations Office at Geneva
Multimedia Newsroom
STORYLINE
38C/100F, a record Arctic temperature confirmed, others likely to follow: WMO
A new and disturbing high temperature record for the Arctic of 38C/100F was confirmed by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) on Tuesday.
Worryingly, the temperature reading in the Russian town of Verkhoyansk taken last June is "just one of a series” of potentially record-breaking observations from around the planet in 2020 that the agency is seeking to verify, spokesperson Clare Nullis told journalists in Geneva.
“The World Meteorological Organization has this morning recognized a temperature of 38 degrees Celsius which is a staggering 100.4 Fahrenheit in the Russian town of Verkhoyansk. It was recorded last year, so 20 June 2020 and we have recognized it as a new Arctic record.”
Describing the record as a temperature “more befitting the Mediterranean than the Arctic”, WMO explained in a statement that average temperatures over Arctic Siberia reached 10C above normal for much of last summer.
It noted that the Siberian town is 115 kilometres north of the Arctic Circle.
“If you cast your mind back to last year, you will recall there was an exceptional, prolonged Siberian heatwave, as a result of this heatwave we saw devastating and very widespread Siberian fires and we saw massive Arctic sea ice loss at the end of the summer season,” Ms. Nullis said.
The furnace-like conditions also contributed to 2020 becoming one of the three warmest years on record, the WMO spokesperson explained, adding that the Siberian heatwave “would have been almost impossible without climate change” – and that a new category for record temperatures in the Arctic had to be created as a result of the Verhoyansk reading and ongoing climate change.
In WMO’s Archive of Weather and Climate Extremes, the category is listed as “highest recorded temperature at or north of 66.5⁰, the Arctic Circle”.
Although WMO’s Nullis warned that the Arctic is “one of the fastest warming parts of the world; it’s warming more than twice as fast as the global average”, she added that climate change has forced up temperatures elsewhere, which the UN agency is busy verifying.
“Last year also there was a new temperature record in the Antarctic continent of 18.3 degrees Celsius that was recorded at an Argentinian base called Esperanza,” she said.
WMO investigators are seeking to verify temperature readings of 54.4C recorded in both 2020 and 2021 in the world’s hottest place, Death Valley in California.
In addition, they are also assessing a new reported European temperature record of 48.8C in the Italian island of Sicily this summer.
“The WMO Archive of Weather and Climate Extremes has never had so many ongoing simultaneous investigations,” said WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas, in a statement.
ends
STORY: Arctic Heat Temperature Record - WMO
TRT: 1 min 50s
SOURCE: UNTV CH
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS
ASPECT RATIO: 16:9
DATELINE: 14 December 2021 GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
SHOTLIST
1. Wide shot: exterior, flag alley, Palais des Nations, United Nations Geneva
2. Wide shot: press briefing room
3. SOUNDBITE (English) – Clare Nullis, World Meteorological Organization (WMO): “The World Meteorological Organization has this morning recognized a temperature of 38 degrees Celsius which is a staggering 100.4 Fahrenheit in the Russian town of Verkhoyansk. It was recorded last year, so 20 June 2020 and we have recognized it as a new Arctic record.”
4. Medium shot, side angle of podium
5. SOUNDBITE (English) – Clare Nullis, World Meteorological Organization (WMO): “If you cast your mind back to last year, you will recall there was an exceptional, prolonged Siberian heatwave, as a result of this heatwave we saw devastating and very widespread Siberian fires and we saw massive Arctic sea ice loss at the end of the summer season.”
6. Wide shot: journalists typing, podium in the background
7. SOUNDBITE (English) – Clare Nullis, World Meteorological Organization (WMO): “The heat that we saw in Siberia in 2020 would have been almost impossible without climate change.”
8. Close-up: journalist
9. SOUNDBITE (English) – Clare Nullis, World Meteorological Organization (WMO): “The Arctic as the WMO keeps saying is one of the fastest warming parts of the world; it’s warming more than twice as fast as the global average.”
10. Medium shot: journalists
11. SOUNDBITE (English) – Clare Nullis, World Meteorological Organization (WMO): “Last year also there was a new temperature record in the Antarctic continent of 18.3 degrees Celsius that was recorded at an Argentinian base called Esperanza.”
12. Medium shot: journalist
13. Medium shot: journalist
Similar Stories
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR
UN rights chief concerned by upheld convictions of Cambodian activists.
1
1
1
Edited News | UNHCR , OHCHR
Middle East crisis puts aid, food, fuel further out of reach for millions already struggling – UN agencies
As the Middle East crisis continues the humanitarian fallout is worsening, with aid route disruptions and food and fuel price hikes wrecking the lives and rights of the most vulnerable, UN agencies warned on Friday.
1
1
2
Edited News | UNMAS
Demining experts from around the world have been sharing their collective shock at the widespread and growing threat from unexploded ordnance, the new head of the UN Mine Action Service (UNMAS) said on Wednesday.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
The UN Human Rights Office in Syria conducted a 5-day visit to the northeast of the country where they received accounts of human rights violations and abuses.
1
1
1
Edited News | UNICEF
Sudan: ‘History repeating itself’ for Darfur’s children - UNICEF
Mass atrocities in Sudan’s Darfur 20 years ago reverberated as far as Hollywood, but today, a new generation of children faces attacks, hunger and displacement in an emergency largely ignored by the outside world, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) warned on Tuesday.
1
1
Edited News | WHO , UNMAS
Desperate and dangerous conditions in Gaza continue to hamper recovery efforts for the wartorn enclave's people, the UN health agency said on Friday, while demining experts warned that they’ve “barely scratched the surface” in assessing the level of contamination of unexploded ordnance.
2
1
2
Press Conferences , Edited News
The continued support of UN Member States to Lebanon will be “indispensable” to boost the country’s national armed forces and provide humanitarian assistance with more than one million people still uprooted by the Middle East war, the UN's peacekeeping chief said on Wednesday.
2
1
2
Press Conferences , Edited News | UNECE
Middle East war: After oil and gas shortages, concerns grow over critical minerals crunch
The shipping crisis in the Strait of Hormuz caused by war in the Middle East has exposed a new threat: a looming shortage of strategic minerals needed to drive economies all over the world and a race by countries to obtain them.
1
1
1
Edited News | IOM
Millions of desperate Sudanese return home amid dire conditions as war rages – IOM
Three years into the devastating conflict in Sudan, nearly four million displaced people have returned to their places of origin across the country, only to face “another struggle for survival”, the UN International Organization for Migration (IOM) said on Tuesday.
1
1
1
Edited News | UNESCO
UNESCO protects cultural sites in war-torn Middle East, confirming damage to key heritage.
1
1
1
Edited News | UN WOMEN
The war in Gaza has inflicted a far higher toll on women and girls than in previous conflicts in the Palestinian enclave, with more than 38,000 killed by Israeli air bombardment and land military operations since Hamas-led terror attacks in Israel sparked the war in October 2023, UN Women said on Friday.
1
1
1
Edited News | UNHCR
In 2025, nearly 900 Rohingya refugees were reported missing or dead in the Andaman Sea and Bay of Bengal, making it the deadliest year on record in South and Southeast Asia, the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, said on Friday.