June and July hottest on record in Western Europe, monitor says

What the report says

Western Europe recorded its hottest June and July on record this summer, according to the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service, in an Al Jazeera report published on Aug. 10, 2026. The climate monitor said the region’s average temperature across the two months reached 21.62C, or 2.79C above average, surpassing the previous record set in 2022.

Copernicus attributed the prolonged warmth to the “exceptional persistence of heat” and said July was the third straight month of unusually high temperatures in the region. The service also said soil moisture was markedly lower than in July 2022, when Western Europe last faced severe drought conditions. In a comment quoted by Al Jazeera, Samantha Burgess of the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts said persistent high-pressure systems trapped heat over the region and that drought conditions reduced the land’s natural cooling effect.

The report said the heat coincided with widespread drought, low river levels and wildfire damage. It noted especially low water on the Seine, Rhine and Danube, and said reduced flows affected water supplies, irrigation and in some cases power generation in Hungary and Slovenia. France and Spain also reported record drought levels, with major fires in southwestern France and near Madrid burning tens of thousands of hectares and prompting large evacuations.

Copernicus also said July brought the highest sea surface temperatures ever recorded outside the polar regions, reinforcing concerns that climate change is intensifying heat extremes and related impacts across Europe.