Last month was the hottest June ever experienced by the Greek capital Athens since meteorological records began in 1860, the National Observatory of Athens said on Monday. However, it was not only Athens that experienced high temperatures over a extended period of time. June 2024 has had in general, extremely high temperatures across the country, compared to previous years.
According to NOA date collected from a network of 53 weather stations of the meteo service in continuous operation since 2010, the year in June the value of the maximum daily temperatures fluctuated at extremely high levels throughout the country , compared to the average of the period 2010-2019.
This year’s June was characterized by many consecutive days with large positive temperature deviations and it was the warmest June since 2010 throughout the country by a very wide margin from the second one.
Central Greece and the Peloponnese recorded the largest positive temperature deviations, with average monthly values ranging up to 4.8 °C above normal levels for the season.
The map shows the deviations of the average maximum temperature in June 2024 by geographical department.
The average temperature over the course of June 2024 came to 29.9 degrees Celsius, with the average daytime high reaching 35.6°C and peaking at 41.2°C on June 13). This was 4.4 degrees Celsius warmer than the 1981-2010 average.
Even more alarming is the fact that the nights were 4.8 degrees Celsius hotter, on average, than the last 30-year point of reference, peaking on June 21-22, when the nighttime low came to a not-so-low 29.5 degrees Celsius.
Local temperature records
Meanwhile, data collected by the NOA’s station in the downtown Thiseio district, the only one in Greece with consecutive years’ worth of figures since 1860, show that the average temperature in Athens already rose last decade by 1.7 degrees Celsius above the 1860-1900 mean.
The pace of increase, however, has accelerated in recent decades, according to experts.
June 2024 is the eight of the hottest 10 Junes ever recorded in Athens during the last 20 years and four of those were in the last decade alone.
source: meteo.gr