Raymond Zhong

The whole planet is warming, but changes in weather patterns could help explain why the continent is suffering so many bouts of severe heat.

The recurring climate phenomenon is expected to peak later this year, but it is already causing dry spells and crop failures on three continents.

The top of the world is warming faster than any other region. For 20 years, the Arctic Report Card chronicled the extraordinary transformation.

The likelihood of hot, dry weather that helps wildfires spread has increased sharply in Europe in recent decades, according to a new report.

A warming planet and a shift away from farming have set the stage for larger fires on the continent. “We must learn to coexist with them,” one report said.

Attribution science is advancing quickly, researchers said. That could support lawsuits seeking damages for severe events worsened by global warming.

Scientists have said the conditions are the result of a climate that is “fundamentally different” from the time before fossil fuel use started rapidly warming the world.

The snowfall from last winter disappeared a month sooner than usual, after two early hot spells. Huge volumes of exposed ice are now starting to vanish.

A scientific analysis concluded that such high temperatures, across so much of the continent, would “not have been possible” without global warming.

The burning of fossil fuels is raising temperatures worldwide, but local factors, on land and at sea, determine which regions warm most rapidly.

Records are being broken for the second time in a month, leading scientists to probe the upper limits of what the warming climate can dish out.