Why is it hotter right now in Scandinavia than in Spain?

"It's the world upside down!" Summarizes the veteran meteorologist Francisco Martín, coordinator of the specialized magazine RAM.

In Finland, the average maximum temperatures at this time of year are around 19°-21°, but the thermometers are marking from June 25 to 30° and 32°, that is, between 10° and 12° above what normal, while Spain, more than 4,000 kilometers to the south, enjoys more than a week of mild temperatures for this time of year, especially in the north and in the west, with values ​​between 5° and 10° lower than the usual

Why?

The reason is that Finland is immersed in a strong and early heat wave with a gigantic radius of action: the blow of fire goes from Algeria ―49°― and Tunisia to Italy ―40°―, Greece and the Balkans and goes up the central and eastern Europe - Switzerland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland and eastern Germany - to the Nordic countries and the Arctic, where 24 records for the highest temperature in June have been broken in the Norwegian area - including 32 .5° at the northernmost point of continental Europe, Tana Bru—and where the Russian city of Norilsk has equaled its all-year high at 32°.

The haze that accompanies the warm air mass reaches Germany and Poland.

On the other hand, Spain is affected by a trough or tongue of cold air.

From Tunisia to Tromsø... Another day of record breaking heat.

Tunisia 🇹🇳 national June record (set last year!) has been equaled today with a piping hot 48.7°C (119.7°F)

Arctic city Tromsø in Norway 🇳🇴 set a new June heat record today with 29.9°C (85.8°F ).

pic.twitter.com/sBUin0Tjlx

— Scott Duncan (@ScottDuncanWX) June 28, 2022

"It's a matter of atmospheric circulation," explains Rubén del Campo, spokesman for the State Meteorological Agency (Aemet).

“Europe is between two areas of low pressure, one in the Atlantic, west of the British Isles, and another in the Black Sea.

Between the two there are high pressures: an anticyclonic ridge or tongue of warm air that comes from low latitudes and extends to the north.

That ridge stabilizes the atmosphere and, at latitudes as high as Scandinavia, the night is very short.

One last factor is that a warm wind from the south is channeled between the two areas of low pressure, which, after traveling through Europe, arrives very overheated in this peninsula”.

Spain is the reverse of the same coin.

"The low pressure area of ​​the Atlantic injects fresh air and winds from the west and northwest to the Iberian Peninsula", which softens the temperatures.

Arctic #Lapland reaches higher temperatures (20-25 ºC) than in #Spain right now

June 29, 2022 @meteociel pic.twitter.com/3V9Dzpuu4F

— RAM Meteorology Fan Magazine (@RAM_meteo) June 29, 2022

But how extraordinary is the situation?

The EFI index (Extreme Forecast Index), with which the rarity of an extreme phenomenon is quantified, yields very high values ​​for the central and eastern strip of Europe, with temperatures reached that are in the 98% percentile and 99%.

“This heat wave is being unusually strong, but not entirely unprecedented.

We have had some even more intense ones in June, for example last year.

Locally, of course, the highest June temperatures on record have been experienced,” confirms Mika Rantanen, from the Climate Change Impact Research Unit of the Finnish Meteorological Institute.

The latest resorts to break their June heat record have been Pori, on the west coast, and the northernmost resort, Utsjoki Nuorgam,

both with 32.9°.

And the minimums are also being intense: tropical nights have been recorded, in which the thermometer does not drop below 20°, on the coast and near lakes.

And what relationship can it have with climate change?

"The link between heat waves and climate change is well established in climate science, so we can say that, although climate change does not cause them, it does make the situation worse," explains Rantanen, who estimates that " temperatures are probably one or two degrees higher, compared to a situation in which there was no climate change.”

Breaking: Finland's northernmost weather station Utsjoki Nuorgam (70°N) set a new June heat record.

Temperature was 30.6°C at 12.20 local time, which exceeds the previous record of 30.5°C on 15.6.1974.

Temperature is still rising.

The final Tmax will be announced later.

pic.twitter.com/tSCqIejGix

— Mika Rantanen (@mikarantane) June 29, 2022

polar jet

"Climate change clearly makes heat waves earlier, more frequent and more intense," agrees Del Campo, who also points out that behind the current situation is the so-called jet stream or polar jet, which normally circulates linearly from west to east with very intense winds and is now more undulating.

"The part of the wave that remains embedded with polar air has lower temperatures -as it happens in Spain-, while on the crest -the entire extensive area of ​​the wave- they shoot up", he details.

This more meandering current means that "cold and warm situations are more frequent and persistent and that the dorsal reaches such high latitudes" and, although "there is greater uncertainty, there are studies that indicate that global warming is what is altering the patterns traffic".

Also,

These changes in the jet stream are also highlighted by the AEMET meteorologist and researcher Juan Jesús González Alemán, who explains that it is "going more and more from being zonal to southern, from south to north or from north to south" and that there are “Indications that point to the fact that the cause of the more frequent and intense southern movements is climate change”.

Other studies also relate it to the melting of the Arctic, although there is some uncertainty.

González recalls that climate change predictions indicate that high and polar latitudes "are warming up more than low latitudes", so heat waves there would be more and more common and harsh compared to its climate.

🌡 Cette carte well illustrates the circulation three méridienne which currently dominates sur l'Atlantique et l'Europe.

The air frais venu du Greenland plonge jusqu'au Portugal tandis que l'air très chaud s'élève du Maghreb jusqu'au nord de la Scandinavie !

(via @wxcharts) pic.twitter.com/CjAOSk0E5R

— Guillaume Séchet (@Meteovilles) June 29, 2022

Francisco Martín adds that the same pattern that explains what is happening in Finland and Spain is repeated in Russia, where there are tremendous cold anomalies, and in the heat waves that these days are affecting China and Japan, where they have been “six days in a row of hell ” and have suffered the hottest day in June in its history, with 40.2 °.

"One of the theories of anthropogenic global warming is that it favors jets with more meandering, more amplified and quasi-stationary, just what is happening," reiterates Martín.

And what is it like for a Finn to live at typical Spanish temperatures?

“The Finns have not got used to this heat well.

If the situation continues, it may have health implications, especially for the elderly," fears the Finnish researcher, who points out that the wave will end in his country "by Monday at the latest and temperatures will return to normal next week."

It will have been 10 days at 30°.

“Of course we love hot weather, as the summer is usually very short here, but in recent years we have had strong heat waves which have started to worry Finns,” adds Rantanen.

“Yes, in the Nordic countries they are scared and thinking about how to adapt to climate change, because a few years ago seeing 30° was a rarity and now they have been seeing it for four consecutive summers and for several days,” confirms Daniel Santos Muñoz, from the Meteorological Institute from Denmark.

Now, Scandinavians dream of air conditioners and "many citizens are thinking of installing them or are already doing so, something unthinkable until now in countries with very mild and short summers."

"Their houses are designed to retain heat, not to defend themselves against it," explains Santos,

Heat records have been shattered many times in Japan.

A total of 263 June record highs have been set in six days.

Tokyo had highs of over 35℃ (95F) for four days in a row, making it the first time on record for June.

And it will be even hotter tomorrow😵 pic.twitter.com/cuNkdDxF15

— Sayaka Mori (@sayakasofiamori) June 28, 2022

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