The Hottest Year Ever, Again?

By Willy Blackmore | Word In Black (WIB) – June 2024 was the hottest June on record, a milestone that can easily get lost in the seemingly endless stream of hottest months ever. But the month was also a little bit different: it beat the record set in June 2023, the month that began what came to be the hottest full year ever recorded. Now, with scorching temperatures throughout the United States and across other parts of the northern hemisphere, there’s a distinct possibility that June 2024 could be the beginning of an even hotter hottest year ever. News that we’ve tipped past one calendar year of record heat, which comes from the& Copernicus Climate Change Service, follows news that June was also the 12th straight month when global temperatures were above the 1.5 degrees Celsius threshold that the world agreed we needed to stay below in order to avoid the worst catastrophes of climate change.& In the Western U.S. alone — where the current heat wave sent temperatures in California’s Death Valley soaring toward 130 degrees— it’s estimated that at least 30 people died from heat-related issues during the first weeks of July. The “at least” is a very...