Six consecutive days without frost in January at 2,876 metres above sea level in the Pyrenees — a record never seen before. Unusual warmth across the entire Alpine arc as well.
Six days without dropping below zero, in January, had never been recorded at the Pic du Midi, in the Hautes-Pyrénées, in France. The location in question sits at 2,876 metres above sea level: a summit that hosts an astronomical observatory and television relay transmitters. From up there, it is possible to admire almost all of the peaks of the Pyrenean chain: from the Basque coast at Biarritz all the way to the Massif de Tabe, to the south-east. And in winter, the landscape is dominated by the white of the snow.
This year, however, the situation in the mountain range dividing Spain and France is dramatic. An exceptional heatwave has brought extraordinarily high temperatures, with the record of 30.7 degrees Celsius set on 25 January in the Iberian town of Gavarda. A situation that has not failed to affect the high mountains as well. The webcams positioned on the peak itself show the colours of winter holding on only at the very summit: already a little further down the valley, the dominant hue is brown.
"We recorded an unprecedented series of six consecutive days without frost, from 24 to 29 January," confirmed the French meteorological service Météo-France. "Previously, three consecutive days had never been exceeded: that had occurred in 1971, 2002 and 2007. A case like the current one, of six days, had only been reached in 1998, but that was in the month of February."
The Alpine arc has also felt the effects of the warmth. In Italy, the freezing level (the highest altitude at which air temperature reaches zero degrees Celsius in the free atmosphere) exceeded 3,500 metres in numerous areas.
On the other side of the world, but still in the northern hemisphere, the situation is equally alarming. In Canada, 3BMeteo reports that "on Monday 29 January, Vancouver reached a peak of 16 degrees Celsius, with the thermometer stopping at 12 degrees the following night. Much further north, Dawson Creek recorded a maximum of 15 degrees, 18 in Abbotsford, while several locations also in British Columbia saw the thermometer reach values of 13/14 degrees."
Furthermore, "the warm bubble pushed Monday's maximum temperature up to 15 degrees at Hendrickson Creek, in the heart of Alberta at nearly 1,500 metres above sea level, as well as in the nearby Nordegg, which represents the record for the month of January. On Tuesday, still in Alberta, peaks of 17 degrees were reached in Claresholm and Masinasin, at around 1,000 metres. In the last 24 hours the warm bubble has shifted eastward and in Saskatchewan a record value for the month of January was reached with 21.1 degrees at Maple Creek, at more than 700 metres above sea level, in areas where temperatures of -30/-35 degrees can be reached at this time of year."
