The thermometer hit a record of 38 degrees Celsius (100.4 degrees Fahrenheit) in the Russian Arctic town of Verkhoyansk on Saturday also considered as one of the coldest places on Earth. Scientists believes that this record high temperature is a signal of a rapidly and continually warming of the planet, and a preview of how Arctic warming will continue in an increasingly hot future. The extreme weather in the town of Verkhoyansk is also the result of a prolonged heat wave linked to wildfires and a massive oil spill in Siberia. It is believed that they have been caused by melting permafrost, crop failures linked to drought and an infestation of tree-eating moths in Siberia.
“For a long time, we’ve been saying we’re going to get more extremes like strong heat waves,” says Ruth Mottram, a climate scientist at the Danish Meteorological Institute. “The projections are coming true, and sooner than we might have thought,” she added. Siberia is in the Guinness Book of World Records for its extreme temperatures. It’s a place where the thermometer has swung 106 degrees Celsius (190 degrees Fahrenheit), from a low of minus 68 degrees Celsius (minus 90 Fahrenheit) to now 38 degrees Celsius+ (100.4 Fahrenheit).
The Arctic region is warming at twice the rate as the rest of the world because of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. The increased rate of warming is because of a phenomenon known as Arctic amplification in which the melting ice hastens the process of warming by exposing areas that are not good at reflecting heat into the atmosphere. This creates a feedback loop between melting ice and rising temperatures, amplifying the impact of warming.
Sergei Semyonov of the Yu. A. Izrael Institute of Global Climate and Ecology in Moscow said that such heat waves aren’t necessarily new to Siberia, but climate change is increasing their severity and length. “This could have an impact on wildfires. It’s not just important to take care of the trees, but also of people. Local forest crews and workers can barely endure such weather,” adds Sergei.
