The Story:
On August 2, the Republic of Greece recorded its highest-ever temperature 46.3C, which is 115.3F. The National Observatory of Athens said this was the temperature in the town of Makrakomi, in the Phthiotis region on the Greek mainland, Monday afternoon.
Significance:
The record highs in Greece of late — the Makrakomi number is merely the outstanding example — have worked against efforts to control the country’s wildfires.
A professor of climate science at a British university, Dann Mitchell, said soon thereafter that the heatwave in southeastern Europe “is not at all unexpected, and very likely enhanced due to human-induced climate change.”
Standing alone, a heat wave of this intensity could be regarded as a “black swan event,” but it comes as part of a broader pattern, and so is “even more deadly.”
Strange New Worlds:
Officials in Greece are considering the idea of giving intense heat waves names, just as tropical storms and other extreme weather events are named. That might have a positive psychological impact. Forty degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) could be a useful benchmark in deciding when an event warrants a name, says Kostas Lagouvardos, research director at the National Observatory.
