Lapland, Finland swelters in record heatwave
world weather News
The region, Finland’s largest by surface, usually hosts records for the nation’s coldest temperatures.
Finland’s northernmost Arctic Lapland region has recorded its hottest temperature for more than a century at 33.6 degrees Celsius (92.5 Fahrenheit), during a heatwave that has been afflicting the entire Nordic country for weeks.
The temperature was measured on Monday at Finland’s northernmost Utsjoki-Kevo weather station near the border with Norway by the Finnish Meteorological Institute.
The institute said there was only one higher historical measurement reported in Lapland – 34.7 C in the Inari Thule area, in July 1914.
The beginning of July has been exceptionally warm in Lapland, one of Europe’s last remaining wildernesses known for its extremely cold winters that attracts domestic and international nature lovers in both summer and winter.
The region, Finland’s largest by surface, usually hosts records for the coldest temperatures in the nation of 5.5 million.
“It is exceptional in Lapland to record temperatures” of over 32 C, Jari Tuovinen, a meteorologist at the Finnish Meteorological Institute, told the Finnish public broadcaster YLE.
He said the current heatwave in Lapland is a result of prevailing high pressure causing warm air in the area.
In addition, “warm air has been brought in from Central Europe to the north through the Norwegian Sea,” Tuovinen told YLE.
Nordic neighbours Norway and Sweden have also recently recorded high temperatures in the north, where the Norwegian municipality of Saltdal recorded 34 C this week.
Finland’s all-time high temperature of 37.2 C was measured in the eastern city of Joensuu in 2010, YLE reported.