The mercury is rising in Spain, and anxiety with it. The country recorded Thursday an absolute temperature record for the month of April with 38.8 degrees Celsius in Cordoba, according to provisional data published Friday by the Spanish meteorological agency.
This temperature, recorded at the weather station of the airport of this Andalusian city, “would be (…) the record temperature in mainland Spain for the month of April”, indicated Aemet on Twitter. The previous record for mainland Spain dates from 2011 and was recorded in Elche with 38.6 degrees.
This “provisional data” must however still be “confirmed”, which could take several days, the organization told AFP. This record is not, however, an absolute record for the whole of Spain, the “historic maximum having been recorded in 2013 in (the archipelago of) the Canaries”, located off the northwest coast of Africa. , said the Aemet again. This record was set at 40.2 degrees.
An early heat wave
Spain is experiencing this week, like neighboring Portugal, an exceptionally early heat wave caused by a mass of hot and dry air coming from North Africa. Friday morning, the thermometer already showed more than 30 degrees, in the province of Jaen, Andalusia.
Episodes of exceptionally high temperatures have multiplied in recent years in Spain, a European country on the front line with nearly 75% of its territory at risk of desertification according to the UN. The country thus experienced its hottest year on record last year, with several heat waves starting in May, according to Aemet.
According to a study by the Polytechnic University of Catalonia published on Tuesday, the number of days of the year marked by summer temperatures rose in Spain from 90 to 145 between 1971 and 2022. Beyond temperatures, Spain, which exports a large part of its agricultural production to the rest of Europe, faces a catastrophic drought which worries farmers and authorities.