Temperatures at record highs for November, scientist confirms

by (ANA) 30 Nov 2010

For those of us that felt uneasy at the long string of warm days that Greece experienced throughout November, when the weather more closely resembled early summer than late autumn, scientists at the national meteorological service EMY confirmed on Monday that we have been experiencing record-breaking temperatures for the current season. The head of EMY, meteorologist Anastasia Papakrivou said that temperatures in Athens reached 25C on Monday and surpassed the previous record for the last 10 days of November - 24C on November 30 1961. This also holds for Thessaloniki, where the mercury climbed to 23C early on Monday morning and was set to surpass the previous record of 23.6C recorded on November 22, 1965. Similarly, temperatures in the first 20 days of the month were higher than the average temperature usually recorded during November in Greece. According to Papakrivou, a rise in the average temperature was indisputable but it was still too early to attribute the phenomenon to global warming since that would take several years and statistical studies to be positively proved. While the high temperatures of the past month were rare, the meteorologist said that they could not be categorised as 'extreme' weather conditions since they did not endanger human health or lives. She advised people to guard against a rise in virus infections due to higher humidity and the red dust clouds carried to Greece from Africa by stronger southerly winds. She also predicted that the unseasonally warm weather and lower-than-usual rainfall will continue at least until Christmas, except for an interval of colder, rainy days this coming weekend.