The warm episode with temperatures more typical of the end of August has concluded throughout Spain, although this Friday it faces its last blows in the eastern half of the peninsula and the archipelagos, with 77 temperature records never before recorded in October (65 during the day and 12 in night) and spread across 35 provinces.
This is clear from the data collected by Servimedia from nearly a hundred stations in the main network of the State Meteorological Agency (Aemet). The late summer episode chained 11 consecutive days with temperature records in some area of Spain, between October 1 and 11.
These anniversaries are distributed across 35 provinces: A Coruña, Álava, Albacete, Almería, Ávila, Badajoz, Burgos, Cáceres, Cádiz, Ciudad Real, Córdoba, Cuenca, Granada, Guipúzcoa, Huesca, Jaén, La Rioja, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria , Lleida, Lugo, Madrid, Navarra, Ourense, Pontevedra, Salamanca, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Segovia, Seville, Soria, Teruel, Toledo, Valladolid, Vizcaya, Zamora and Zaragoza.
Until this year, the heat ceiling in October in mainland Spain was 37.5 degrees measured on October 22, 2014 in Marbella (Málaga). The Cordoba town of Montoro reached 38.2 degrees on October 1, an event that the Aemet station located in the Sevillian neighborhood of Tablada equaled a day later.
WARMEST DAY
The hottest day of the episode was Sunday, October 1, with 37 records at major stations (35 of them during the day and two at night). Two of them are centenary: 34.4 degrees in the Zaragoza town of Daroca (with data since 1920), and 33.2 in Zamora (since 1920). And the Vitoria airport registered 33.7 degrees, which is 4.4 more than the previous anniversary (29.3 on October 4, 2004, with data since 1973).
On Friday, October 6, there were 37.6 degrees at the Córdoba airport and 30.1 in the Retiro park in Madrid (whose station has data since 1920),
During last weekend, it should be noted that the anomalous heat spread throughout Galicia. Specifically, this Saturday turned out to be a historic day because it was the hottest in the four provincial capitals (33.4 in A Coruña; 32.8 in Lugo; 35.3 in Ourense, and 32.7 in Pontevedra), as well as in the capital of the autonomous community (31.0 in Santiago de Compostela).
On Sunday, 33.2 degrees stood out at the Madrid-Barajas Airport, the first time it exceeded 33 degrees on an October day since 1945. Furthermore, that morning was the hottest ever recorded in October in Santa Cruz de Tenerife ( 26.1 degrees, with data since 1920), the Gran Canaria airport (27.7 degrees, since 1951) and the Lanzarote airport (27.6 degrees, since 1973).
Last Monday, two other records for the warmest night in October were broken, with 27.8 degrees at the Gran Canaria airport, and 25.5 at the Tenerife North airport (in this case, the historical series begins in 1941).
The last two events occurred at the El Hierro airport, where this Tuesday the record for the hottest day in October was observed (35.4 degrees maximum temperature) and on Wednesday the warmest morning of this month was recorded (26, 2 degrees minimum temperature).
RECORDS OF WARM DAYS
This ‘veroño’ chained 10 warm days with consecutive heat records in the whole of Spain since at least 1950, since each day from September 29 to October 8 was the hottest of those dates for more than seven decades.
The historical series of records for warm days in Spain begins in 1951. During the first two decades there were many because records were scarce. “In the beginning it was easy to have many record days, both cold and warm consecutively. As time goes by, not only is it more difficult for records to occur, but it is also more difficult for several record days to occur consecutively,” Aemet spokesperson Rubén del Campo explained to Servimedia.
Considering as a reference since 1970, the maximum number of warm days with consecutive records for warm days was nine (September 12-20, 1987). The next period covered from July 11 to 18, 2022, that is, eight consecutive days. “It is extraordinary because it is the penultimate year of the analysis, when in theory it would be very difficult to chain so many consecutive days of records,” said Del Campo. Both episodes have been surpassed by the one in October 2023.
All in all, Spain has already recorded 30 records for warm days this year and none for cold days. “For both cases, five would be expected in a full year. Therefore, in 2023 we have multiplied by six the record of warm days expected for the entire year,” added Del Campo.
LATE NOTICES
Another unique feature of this late summer in October is that on Saturday, October 7, Aemet activated the latest heat warning since it launched the Meteoalert plan in 2006.
This yellow level warning – risk for outdoor activities – was due to the forecast that areas of Asturias (center and Mining Valleys) and Cantabria (Liébana) would reach 34 degrees.
This situation is added to the fact that Aemet activated on Wednesday, October 4, the first orange warning – important risk – for intense heat since 2006, since it predicted 37 degrees in the east, south and west of the island of Gran Canaria.
MORE THAN 40 DEGREES IN THE CANARY ISLANDS
On the other hand, this ‘veroño’ has brought more than 40 degrees to the Canary Islands for the first time in the month of October since 2017. The archipelago has had several days in a row of heat waves, the tenth in this month since at least 1975.
The Aemet data, collected by Servimedia, indicate that the meteorological station of the secondary network located in Sabinosa, a town in the municipality of Frontera (island of El Hierro), marked 40.6 degrees of maximum temperature around 3:00 p.m. This is a new heat record in that place, above the 34.8 degrees of a day in October 2017, with a historical series that began in 2009.
In addition, it is the second highest temperature ever recorded in October in the Canary Islands, only behind the 43.2 degrees observed in Morro Jable (Fuerteventura island) on October 13, 2017. Behind it are the 40.0 degrees recorded in Valverde (El Hierro) in 1954, San Cristóbal de la Laguna (Tenerife) in 1971 and Arrecife (Lanzarote) in 2015.
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