UN weather agency affirms 2020 Arctic heat record in Siberia

GENEVA (AP) — The U.N. weather agency has certified a 38-degree Celsius (100.4 Fahrenheit) reading in the Russian town of Verkhoyansk last year as the highest temperature ever recorded in the Arctic. The World Meteorological Organization said the temperature “more befitting the Mediterranean than the Arctic” was recorded in June 2020 during a heat wave that swept across Siberia and stretched north of the Arctic Circle. Average temperatures were up to 10 degrees Celsius more than usual in Arctic Siberia. It played a key role in forest fires, loss of sea ice and global temperature rises that made 2020 one of the three hottest years on record.