In Kolkata, in the morning the thermometer rose to +8.4 degrees, but at 1 pm the air had cooled down to +2.7 degrees.
+8.0 degrees was registered in Riga in the morning. The previous heat record on December 30 in the capital was +7.8 degrees in 2019. In the afternoon, the air temperature in Riga dropped to +2..+3 degrees.
In Bauska, on the other hand, the maximum air temperature in the middle of the day was +7.7 degrees.
Starting from the north of the country, cooler air flows into Latvia and the wind dies down. In some parts of Vidzeme, the rain has been replaced by snow, the roads have become slippery in some places.
The strongest wind gusts – 22.5 meters per second – were recorded in Ventspils.
It has already been reported that this year there were only seven new cold records in Latvia, while the number of corrected maximum air temperature records reached 324 until December 28.
December is the eleventh consecutive month with an above-normal average temperature. The year 2024 is one of the two warmest in the history of Latvian meteorological observations; this year’s average air temperature is approximately +8.8 degrees – similar to 2020.
The climatic standard norm of the annual average air temperature, or the average temperature of 1991-2020 in Latvia, is +6.8 degrees. It is 1.1 degrees higher than the average air temperature of the climatic reference period, i.e. 1961-1990.
Scientists predict that in the second half of the century, the average annual air temperature in Latvia may exceed +10 degrees. However, there is a possibility that as global warming melts glaciers and increases rainfall, sea currents in the Atlantic Ocean may stop, which would mean a sharp drop in temperature in Northern Europe.
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