A new study reveals that extreme heat events are expanding their presence outside the traditional warm season, although the change is not happening in the same way in all regions of the planet.
The results of the study show that the seasons of extreme heat have lengthened significantly.Extreme heat is becoming increasingly common. Science has been documenting this for years, and millions of people experience it. However, a new study focuses on a less analyzed aspect: when these episodes occur and how their distribution is changing throughout the year .
The research found that extreme heat has not only intensified during the traditionally warmer seasons. In many regions, it is also occurring more frequently during the months immediately before or after the usual warm season.
The timing is not a minor detail. An early heat wave can be especially demanding on the body, which has not yet adapted to the season’s temperatures. Something similar happens at the end of the season, when people and communities have already been exposed to adverse thermal conditions for months.
Furthermore, alert systems and cooling centers are usually prepared according to a seasonal schedule that could become increasingly outdated.
The extreme heat is spreading unevenly.
The study was conducted by climatologists from NASA and New York University and published in the journal AGU Advances . Its authors analyzed extreme heat events recorded on all six inhabited continents.
To establish a reference point, they compared the period 1980-1989 with the most recent decade available, between 2015 and 2024. They considered as extreme those
Original Record.
This archived record authored by ‘Jenniffer Guerra’ at ‘METEORED (Your Weather)’ was recovered from data set:
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