
Western Europe experienced its hottest June-July period on record, with a combined average temperature of 21.62°C, surpassing the 2022 benchmark for the same two months, the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service announced on Monday. The region has endured successive heatwaves, extreme drought and widespread wildfires, with soil moisture levels "significantly lower" than during the last severe drought in July 2022, according to Copernicus.
The dry conditions extended across western and central Europe, including France, Spain, Austria, Hungary, the United Kingdom, Ireland and parts of Iceland. Major rivers such as the Seine, Rhine and Danube registered unusually low flows, disrupting transport, irrigation and energy production in multiple countries. Copernicus noted that the persistence of heat since late spring—with four distinct heatwaves since May—was exceptional for the region.
Samantha Burgess, strategic climate lead at the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, which operates Copernicus, stated that the data showed "a clear example of how climate change is intensifying heat extremes, with heat and drought increasingly reinforcing one another." The hot, dry conditions also fueled extreme wildfire risk, with France and Spain battling some of their worst blazes in living memory, while other fires raged in parts of the U.S. Northwest and Canada.
Global ocean temperatures also set new records in July, marking the second consecutive month of unprecedented warmth. The global average sea surface temperature reached 20.96°C, exceeding the previous record set in July 2023, driven by marine heatwaves around Europe and a strengthening El Niño in the Pacific, Copernicus reported. The service’s data, which extends back to 1950, confirmed that July 2026 was the second-warmest globally, tied with 2024, at approximately 16.90°C, trailing only July 2023’s 16.95°C.
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