A look at heat records that have been broken around the world

This year has already seen many heat records broken as the world grows hotter with more and more greenhouse gases added to the atmosphere.

For many places, the highest temperatures since record-keeping began have come in just the last 10 to 15 years. That’s the clearest possible sign that humans are altering the climate, said Randall Cerveny, a professor at Arizona State University.

Cerveny said temperatures in India, the Middle East, and the U.S. Southwest have been exceptionally hot in 2024.

Las Vegas recorded 120 degrees Fahrenheit (48.0 degrees Celsius) on Sunday for the first time in history.

“It feels like the air is a blanket of just hotness that is enveloping you,” Cerveny said about that kind of heat. It’s life threatening and people are unprepared for it, he added.

Here is a look at some of the records that have been broken around the world this year. Even one tenth of one degree above a previous record is a meaningful increase, and these records were all broken by at least seven times that amount.

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