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Human contribution to the record-breaking July 2019 heat wave in Western Europe

  • 02/08/2019

This study assesses how human-induced climate change has altered the likelihood and intensity of the July event or similar events. It uses a large number of climate simulations that were available at the time of study (8 ensembles of 10 to over 100 simulations each). Define the event as the class of events exceeding the observed values of daily mean temperatures averaged over 3 days for a few locations in Western Europe. Three days in a row of high temperatures are often considered as the minimal length for a hot spell to have potential health impacts.