Worldwide this February has been the hottest ever recorded. Worryingly, the ocean temperatures in February were also the highest ever recorded.
Sea surface temperatures were the highest for any month on record, Copernicus said, smashing the previous heat extremes seen in August 2023 with a new high of just over 21C at the end of the month.
Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) service last month said the period from February 2023 to January 2024 marked the first time Earth had endured 12 consecutive months of temperatures 1.5 degrees Celsius hotter than the pre-industrial era.
It was the ninth consecutive month of historic high temperatures across the planet, as climate change steers the world into "uncharted territory", Europe's climate monitor has said.
