Excessive heat in Siberia is man-made 0:56
(CNN) --
Two years ago, UK meteorologists conducted an interesting thought experiment: What will our forecasts look like in 2050?
The climate crisis is pushing the weather to extremes around the world, and temperatures in northern latitudes have been especially sensitive to these changes.
So meteorologists at the Met Office, the UK's official weather forecasting agency, dove into very long-range climate models in the summer of 2020 to see what kind of temperatures would be forecast in about three decades.
"Not an actual weather forecast," the Met Office charts said.
"They are examples of plausible weather based on climate projections."
Well, on Monday and Tuesday, the "plausible" will become a reality... 28 years before.
Temperatures are forecast to be 10-15 degrees warmer than normal early next week in the UK.
Simon Lee, an atmospheric scientist at Columbia University in New York, noted the striking similarity between the outlook for 2050 and the forecast for early next week in the UK.
"Today the forecast for Tuesday is surprisingly nearly identical for large parts of the country," Simon tweeted, adding in a subsequent post that "what's coming Tuesday gives a glimpse of the future."
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In 2020, the @metoffice produced a hypothetical weather forecast for 23 July 2050 based on UK climate projections.
Today, the forecast for Tuesday is shockingly almost identical for large parts of the country.
pic.twitter.com/U5hQhZwoTi
— Dr Simon Lee (@SimonLeeWx) July 15, 2022
Thirty years from now, this forecast will seem fairly typical.
Temperatures are forecast to be 10-15°C warmer than normal early next week in the UK.
Highs could approach 40C for the first time, a prediction that has prompted forecasters to issue a "red" heat alert for the first time in history.
To be clear, this would be really record heat.
The highest temperature ever measured in the country was 38.7°C at the Cambridge Botanic Garden in 2019.
It is also clearly a sign of how fast the climate crisis is altering our time.
"We had hoped that we would not get to this situation," Met Office climate change attribution scientist Nikos Christidis said in a statement.
"Climate change has already influenced the likelihood of extreme temperatures in the UK. The chances of record 40C days in the UK could be up to 10 times more likely in the current climate than under a natural climate unaffected by human influence."
The probability of exceeding 40C "is increasing rapidly," Christidis said.
It's about more than just a few awkward days.
Extreme heat is one of the deadliest weather events, we just don't often see it at the time, when heat stroke and deaths are attributed to underlying conditions like heart or respiratory disease.
Furthermore, recent reports suggest that no more than 5% of UK homes have air conditioning to help keep residents cool.
A dangerous and prolonged heat wave threatens millions in Western Europe, as the highest heat alerts are issued
Last summer we saw a strikingly similar situation in the United States, when the Pacific Northwest was hit by extreme heat for days.
Hundreds of people died in that heat wave.
Officials in British Columbia said there were more than 800 "excess deaths" during the heat, deaths that were unexpected and far from the norm for that time of year.
Unlike floods or wildfires that destroy a city, the sense of urgency around a deadly heat wave isn't as shocking, said Kristie Ebi, a climate and health researcher at the University of Washington, noting that the heat is a "silent killer".
Heat waves: how to protect yourself from extreme heat and what diseases and problems it can cause
"When it's hot outside, it's just hot outside, so it's a relatively silent killer," Ebi previously told CNN.
"People are generally unaware and don't think about the risks associated with these high temperatures."
He also said that it is important to understand that the weather is not like it was a few years ago.
The climate crisis is already affecting our lives today, and it will continue to hit the most vulnerable.
"We all look forward to the summer to enjoy the warmer temperatures, but there are people who are at risk with these higher temperatures," he said.
"As the climate continues to change or temperatures are higher than what we experienced when we were younger, people need to pay more attention, especially to those around them."
-- Rachel Ramirez contributed to this report.
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