Western Europe Just Had Its Hottest June Ever

Western Europe just experienced its hottest June ever recorded, according to the European Union's climate monitoring service. A powerful heatwave swept across the continent this past June, pushing temperatures far above normal. The EU's Copernicus Climate Change Service reported the findings on Thursday. Scientists say climate change is the main reason behind the extreme heat.

The average temperature in western Europe reached 20.74 degrees Celsius in June. That is more than 3 degrees above the normal range for that time of year. It broke the previous record, which had also been set recently in June 2025. June was also the second hottest on record for the entire world and for Europe as a whole.

A weather event called a 'heat dome' made the heatwave especially dangerous. A heat dome is a high-pressure system in the atmosphere that traps hot air close to the ground, much like a lid on a boiling pot. This caused temperatures in many countries to break all-time records. More than 410 million Europeans — that is more than two-thirds of the continent's population — endured temperatures above 35 degrees Celsius between June 15 and June 30.

The heatwave caused thousands of deaths, mostly in France, Spain, and Belgium. Scientists say high humidity made things even worse. Because the air held so much moisture, people could not cool down at night. 'It was extremely humid, which then meant people didn't get relief at night,' said Samantha Burgess, a climate expert at the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts.

The Mediterranean Sea also hit record high temperatures during June. When the sea is warm, it does not send cool breezes to the coast, making nights hotter for people living nearby. Dry conditions in eastern Europe raised the risk of drought. In parts of Spain and southern France, wildfires broke out due to the hot and dry weather.

Climate scientists say events like this would have been nearly impossible without climate change. A group called World Weather Attribution said the June heatwave was the 'most severe ever recorded.' They also said a similar heatwave in 2003 would have been about 2 degrees cooler without today's level of climate change.

Europe is warming faster than any other continent in the world. Changes in wind and air patterns are making heatwaves happen more often and last longer. Burgess warned that this is only the beginning. 'They will be more intense and they will last longer, and they will impact more geographical areas,' she said.

Experts say Europe needs to adapt to a hotter future. Many of Europe's old buildings were not built to handle extreme heat. Burgess pointed out that the climate those buildings were designed for no longer exists. She also said the world needs to stop releasing greenhouse gases from fossil fuels as quickly as possible. 'Heatwaves will only get worse the more fossil fuel we pump into the atmosphere,' she said.