April heatwave up to 20°C higher than normal in Western-Mediterranean heatwave

Sentinel-3 SLSTR LST acquired on 15 April 2023 from 09:58:16 to 11:03:02 UTC
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Sentinel-3 SLSTR LST acquired on 30 April 2023 at 11:14:18 UTC
Sentinel-3 SLSTR RBT acquired on 01 May 2023 from 09:46:18 to 10:48:07 UTC
Author(s): Sentinel Vision team, VisioTerra, France - svp@visioterra.fr
Keyword(s): Climate change, heatwave, drought, food security, Spain, Portugal, Morocco Algeria
Fig. 1 - S3 SLSTR (15-30.04.2023) - Temperatures surged up to 20°C higher than normal across large parts of Morocco, Algeria, Spain and Portugal.
2D view
Temperatures surged up to 20C higher than normal across large parts of the western Mediterranean. Temperatures exceeded 40°C in parts of Morocco and Algeria. In Spain, temperatures reached 38.8C at Córdoba airport.
Fig. 2 - S3 SLSTR (01.05.2023) - Many local April temperature records broken by up to 6°C. It also set a new April record for all of Europe.
2D view
In its most rapidly produced study to date, the World Weather Attribution service, which launched in 2014, finds that the heatwave was up to 3.5C hotter than it would have been in a world without climate change.
Fig. 3 - S3 SLSTR (01.05.2023) - NDWI-SM - Affected areas are important fruits exporters, this event is likely to increase food price this year.
2D view
Researchers found that climate change made the heatwave at least 100 times more likely. Their study adds that, even in today’s climate, the heatwave was unlikely, with roughly a 0.25% chance of happening in a given year.
The views expressed herein can in no way be taken to reflect the official opinion of the European Space Agency or the European Union.
Contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data 2024, processed by VisioTerra.
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