The world experienced its second warmest March and Antarctic sea ice reached its second lowest extent for the month, following a record low in February, according to data from the European Climate Observatory, released on Thursday.
“After a record low extent in February, Antarctic sea ice reached its second lowest level for March in the 45 years that satellite data has been recorded,” said Samantha Burgess, deputy head of the European Union’s Copernicus climate change observatory.
In March, which corresponds to the southern autumn, the sea ice extent was 28% below average. It amounted to 3.2 million km2, 1.2 million below the 1991-2020 average for that month, a Copernicus spokesman told French news agency AFP.
Arctic sea ice 4% below average
On the other side of the Earth, Arctic sea ice extent was 4% below average.
Copernicus further estimates that last month was the second warmest March globally, tied with March 2017, 2019 and 2020. The warmest March on record is 2016.
Temperatures last month were above average in central and southern Europe but below average in most of northern Europe.
It was warmer than usual over large areas, including northern Africa, southwestern Russia and most of Asia, where many monthly records were broken.
Well-above-average temperatures were also recorded in northeastern North America, Argentina and its neighbours, large parts of Australia and coastal Antarctica.
The past eight years have been the warmest on record globally, all exceeding pre-industrial temperatures by more than a degree, Copernicus had established in January.
