Exceptional softness: the month of February should be the 25th in a row above standards in France

Des arbres déjà en fleur, conséquence d'un hiver très doux. Midi Libre – MiKAEL ANISSET

L'ingénieur agronome et docteur en agroclimatologie Serge Zaka estime que la température moyenne de ce mois de février aura été 3,1°C supérieure à la normale. C'est évidemment inquiétant.

"After more than a month of exceptional mildness, February 2024 will be the 25th month above (or on) the standards following an anomaly around +3.1°C!& ;quot;

A few days before the end of the month, the specialist in agroclimatology, Hérault resident Serge Zaka, finalized his calculations. And, according to his estimates (with a margin of error of 0.3°C, he specifies), a new record for softness will be broken. Proof of global warming which has accelerated, this is even the 25th consecutive month that the average temperature will be above or equal to (as in April 2022 and 2023) & nbsp;at seasonal norms. 

This observation is not surprising. The first half of February broke many heat records almost everywhere in France. On Saturday 3, for example, the town of Céret, in the Pyrénées-Orientales, had reached 27.5°C, reaching the heat stage, like many weather stations that day. Two days later, the Aigoual resort, located at an altitude of more than 1,600 meters in the Gard, recorded 18°C, dashing the ski resort's last hopes of seeing snow falling before the holidays. Among other examples…

The region is obviously not the only one to have seen the thermometer panic. On February 15, considered the mildest day of winter, the 20°C mark was regularly reached or crossed, sometimes as far as the Centre-Val de Loire region, in Auvergne. or even in Sarthe. In the southwest, peaks of up to 27°C were even observed in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques. That day, the national thermal indicator reached a value of 12.6 °C, a temperature 6.6 °C higher than normal! 

One of the two mildest winters

Already that day, the climatologist from Météo France, Christine Berne, predicted in Libération that the month of February "exceptionally hot" would break a new record. "OIt has been 3 to 5°C above normal every day since the beginning of February, and no cooling is expected until the end of next week", < /em> she noticed. It indicated that since the beginning of the year, in a month and a half, Météo France has already counted "fifty exceedances of 20°C&quot ;, which will make this winter one of the two mildest in history. Perpignan and Nîmes were then the two cities with the most excesses.