RECORD TEMPERATURES ARE set to be broken across the Northern Hemisphere, with heat health warnings and evacuations in place.
But while Europe, the globe’s fastest-warming continent, could record its hottest-ever temperature this week, Ireland has remained relatively cool.
Italy’s islands of Sicily and Sardinia could reach a high of 48 degrees today, breaking the continent’s previous record high.
16 Italian cities are under red weather alerts, including Rome, where temperatures are due to hit 42C-43C tomorrow, which would smash the record of 40.5C set in August 2007.
Spain is also reckoning with what meteorologists have described as “abnormally high” temperatures, while the mercury in Romania is expected to reach 39 degrees today.
Elsewhere across the continent, villagers in the south-east of Athens were ordered to leave their homes today as a wildfire burned nearby.
The Acropolis in Athens resumed its regular opening hours after shutting for a few hours during the previous three days.
However, a new heatwave is expected in Greece from Thursday and meteorologists warned of a heightened risk of wildfires amid strengthening winds from the Aegean Sea.
In the midst of the heat alerts across much of southern Europe today, Ireland is looking at highs of 18 degrees.
It was a much different picture here at home this week last year, when the highest ever temperature for the month of July was recorded.
That happened when the mercury hit 33 degrees in Dublin’s Phoenix Park on 18 July, 2022.
That temperature was 12.9 degrees above the 1981-2010 long-term average for July.
“The average temperatures for July are around 17 to 20 degrees maximum, and 10 or 11 degrees minimum,” explains Met Éireann meteorologist Linda Hughes when speaking to The Journal.
“So the temperatures this week in Ireland are near or slightly below normal for July,” she adds.
Hughes also said it isn’t “unusual” for Ireland to be quite cool while the rest of Europe sees very high temperatures.
“It wouldn’t be very surprising for us and the northwest fringes of Europe to have much cooler weather,” said Hughes, who added that the weather in Ireland is dependent on the jet streams.
“The positioning of Ireland means that we’re very influenced by the jet stream – that’s the really strong winds about nine or 10 kilometres above the surface,” explains the Met Éireann meteorologist.
“They dictate what our weather’s going to be like and the positioning of it will determine if we have cooler weather or warmer weather.
“So in June when we had warmer conditions, jet streams would have been positioned to the north of us, so we’re on the warmer side of the jet stream.
“At the moment that’s shifted further south, so the jet stream does fluctuate a lot and the positioning of Ireland means that it can dramatically change the type of June or July we get.”
Hughes told The Journal that the positioning of the jet stream at the south of Ireland means we’re in a “cooler air mass”.
An air mass is a large area of air in the atmosphere that creates distinctive weather conditions.
“We’re kind of on the border of cool and warm air masses quite a lot of the time,” notes Hughes.
“If we’ve got high pressure over us and a warm air mass sitting over Ireland, that can bring very warm or hot conditions in July, but the air is coming from a different direction to what we had last year.
“So it’s not very unusual for us to have significantly cooler weather than southern Europe during the summertime.”
Hughes added that there is a “west to north-west airflow” in Ireland this week, which is bringing down air from the North and means Ireland is not seeing any of the heat that is currently being experienced in southern Europe.
“The wind direction isn’t right to bring that up towards us,” adds Hughes.
Looking ahead, Hughes said there is an “area of low pressure moving in over Ireland and the UK early next week”.
Hughes said that could usher in “some heavy rain and thunderstorms but nothing completely unusual”.
But looking further ahead, Hughes warned that climate change is going to result in “more frequent” hot weather.
“We have been seeing record breaking temperatures, even in Ireland, over the past couple of years, and widespread across the world this week, we’re seeing record breaking temperatures,” said Hughes.
“Climate change is going to bring us more frequent, very hot weather over the coming years.”
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