The year 2024 has become a chilling testament to Europe's intensifying climate change, bringing increasingly extreme and devastating anomalies. The region as a whole has experienced the warmest year in recorded history, with widespread and often fatal impacts affecting millions of people across the continent. Climate statistics reveal alarming trends in temperatures, precipitation, humidity and even critical permafrost ecosystems [WMO 2025a, WMO 2025b].

Global warning signs affecting Europe: European lakes and their surface water temperatures (LSWT) were global record-breakers. The average LSWT for Europe reached an anomaly +0.77 °C above the reference average, which is the largest anomaly since records began in 1995Shocking 86 % European lakes showed positive LSWT anomalies. The total column water vapor (TCWV) over Europe also reached extremely positive anomalies, ranging between 15 % and 20 % above normal, indicating a significantly wetter atmosphere that may lead to more intense precipitation.

Europe on the Brink: Devastating Regional Events: While total annual precipitation in Europe appeared to be close to normal, this figure masks devastating regional extremes [WMO 2025a].

• Western Europe experienced fourth warmest year and was generally wetter. Belgium and Luxembourg experienced the wettest year in history, with the total reaching 140 % above normal in Uccle (Belgium) and 143 % above normal in Findel (Luxembourg) [WMO 2025a, 474]. In October, they fell in southeastern France (Cevennes) record 48-hour rainfall totals (200–400 mm, in places 500–600 mm), which is more than twice the monthly normal [WMO 2025b].
• Central Europe suffered the warmest year in recorded history [WMO 2025a, 475], with the spring being the warmest in the region's history [WMO 2025b]. In September, it brought Storm Boris extreme rainfall and widespread flooding to Austria, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, southern Poland and southeastern Germany, with totals of 200–500 mm. This event was classified as 100-year event [Magnusson et al. 2025, Kimutai et al. 2024, Gramlich 2024, Greilinger et al. 2024, Rustemeier et al. 2024, WMO 2025b, 471].
• Iberian Peninsula was hit by repeated heat waves [WMO 2025b]. In Spain, October was record wet [WMO 2025b, 476], which culminated in catastrophic floods in Valencia on October 29The intensity of precipitation reached historical records: 184.6 mm in one hour, 620.6 mm in six hours and 720.4 mm in twelve hours. These floods required at least 224 victims and caused damage exceeding 13 billion euros [Kothari 2024, Pucik 2024, WMO 2025b].
• Nordic and Baltic countries experienced the second wettest year in Denmark [WMO 2025b, 476], while storm Kirsti in late July brought to Latvia new national record for 24-hour rainfall (198.3 mm) [WMO 2025b].
• Mediterranean region recorded the warmest year in history, with each country in the region (including Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, North Macedonia, Greece and Bulgaria) reaching its own historical maximum [WMO 2025a, WMO 2025b, 477]. The region was plagued by unusually long heat waves, and in late November and early December, the Bora storm over Greece caused heavy rainfall (up to 550 mm) and floods with two victims [WMO 2025b].
• Eastern Europe broke its temperature records and recorded the warmest year in history [WMO 2025a, 478]. Anomalies in Belarus, Moldova, Romania and Ukraine exceeded +2 °C. Spring was the warmest on record. Ukraine experienced in April record rainfall, but then in May for the first time since 1961 no precipitation was recorded in many areas. Romania had fifth driest agricultural year, which led to widespread soil drought [WMO 2025b].

Permafrost on the verge of collapse: Permafrost temperatures reached 2024 in European mountains record high values at a depth of 10 meters [Noetzli et al. 2024a, WMO 2025b]. As a result of three consecutive exceptionally warm years and early snow cover in the winter of 2024, the active layer thickness (ALT) on the Swiss Schilthorn tripled to more than 13 meters. A worrying finding is that the ground did not freeze at all in the winter of 2024 [Noetzli et al. 2024a, WMO 2025b].

These large-scale and often deadly anomalies in 2024 are a clear signal that Europe is facing a new era of climate change, which is no longer a distant threat but a harsh reality with devastating consequences. JRi

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Glossary of key terms

• Cumulative Cyclone Energy (ACE): An integrated metric of the strength, frequency, and duration of tropical storms and hurricanes.
• Active layer (Permafrost): The layer of earth that thaws and freezes again every year is located above permafrost.
• Antarctic ozone hole: An area in the stratosphere above Antarctica where there has been a significant loss of ozone.
• Antarctic sea ice: The extent of sea ice in the Southern Ocean, around Antarctica.
• Argo (data): A global system of free-floating probes that measure temperature and salinity in the oceans, providing data on ocean heat and salinity.
• Atmospheric aerosols: Tiny particles suspended in the atmosphere that affect climate by scattering and absorbing radiation and influencing clouds.
• Brewer-Dobson circulation (BDC): Large-scale circulation in the stratosphere that transports air from the tropics to the polar regions, affecting the distribution of ozone.
• Carbon Dioxide (CO2): The main long-lived greenhouse gas released by human activity, whose atmospheric concentrations continue to increase.
• Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs): A group of chemicals regulated by the Montreal Protocol for their ozone-depleting properties and strong greenhouse effect.
• El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO): A natural climate phenomenon that has a warm phase (El Niño) and a cold phase (La Niña) that affects global weather and climate.
• Equivalent temperature (Teq): A term that combines air temperature and humidity to provide a more comprehensive measure of the energy content of the atmosphere.
• Global Mean Sea Level (GMSL): The average sea level around the world, which changes due to the thermal expansion of water and the melting of ice.
• Global reference glaciers: Specific 58 glaciers around the world that are continuously monitored for changes in their mass balance.
• Hydrological cycle: The continuous movement of water on, above and below the Earth.
• Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD): A natural climatic phenomenon characterized by fluctuations in sea surface temperature between the western and eastern Indian Oceans.
• Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ): A band of low pressure surrounding the Earth near the equator where trade winds converge and produce intense precipitation.
• Cryosphere: All parts of the Earth where water is in solid form, including glaciers, snow cover, and sea ice.
• Kuroshio Extension: An extension of the Kuroshio Current in East Asia, characterized by shifts in current anomalies and ocean heat content.
• Long-lived greenhouse gases (LLGHG): Greenhouse gases that remain in the atmosphere for long periods of time (decades to centuries), such as CO2, CH4, and N2O.
• Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO): The largest element of intraseasonal variability in tropical weather, manifesting as an eastward-directed area of increased precipitation.
• Major Development Area (MDR): An area in the Atlantic where tropical cyclones typically form.
• Marine heat waves (MHW): Periods of five or more consecutive days with sea surface temperatures above the 90th percentile of the daily climatology.
• Mass Balance (glaciers): The difference between the amount of snow that accumulates on a glacier and the amount of ice that is lost from it through melting or breaking off.
• Methane (CH4): A potent greenhouse gas released from natural and anthropogenic sources, the concentrations of which continue to rise.
• Montreal Protocol: An international treaty designed to protect the ozone layer by phasing out the production of many substances responsible for damaging the ozone layer.
• Nitrous Oxide (N2O): A long-lived greenhouse gas whose concentrations in the atmosphere continue to increase.
• Nighttime sea air temperature (NMAT): The temperature of the air just above the ocean surface at night, which serves as an important indicator of ocean warming.
• Ocean heat content (OHC): The amount of heat stored in the ocean, a key indicator of global warming.
• Oceanic Niño Index (ONI): Three-month (seasonal) moving average of sea surface temperature anomalies in the Niño-3.4 region, used to classify El Niño and La Niña events.
• Ozone-depleting substances (ODS): Chemicals that damage the stratospheric ozone layer.
• Permafrost: Permafrost is soil or rock that remains at or below 0°C for at least two consecutive years.
• Previous Rain Event (PRE): A band of intense rainfall that develops ahead of a tropical cyclone and can lead to widespread flooding.
• Radiative Forcing (RF): The difference between solar energy absorbed by the Earth and the energy radiated back into space.
• Rock Glaciers: Landforms formed by the slow creep of permanently frozen soil (permafrost), the speed of which indicates changes in the thermal state of the permafrost.
• Snow cover extent (SCE): The area of the Earth's surface covered with snow.
• Sea Surface Temperature (SST): The temperature of the water at the top of the ocean.
• Sea surface salinity (SSS): The concentration of dissolved salts in the surface waters of the ocean, influenced by the hydrological cycle.
• Short-lived climatic factors (SLCF): Substances that have a lifespan of from a few hours to about two decades and affect the climate.
• Southern Annular Mode (SAM): The pattern of atmospheric pressure variability that affects the Southern Hemisphere.
• South Pacific Convergence Zone (SPCZ): A band of precipitation that extends from the western Pacific Ocean towards the southeast.
• Stratospheric aerosols: Aerosols present in the stratosphere, which can come from volcanic eruptions or forest fires and affect the radiation balance.
• Stratospheric ozone: Most of the ozone in the Earth's atmosphere is found in the stratosphere and protects against harmful ultraviolet radiation.
• Stratospheric temperature: The temperature in the stratosphere, which is affected by greenhouse gases and other atmospheric phenomena.
• Stratospheric water vapor (WV): Water vapor in the stratosphere, which can be influenced by volcanic eruptions and affects ozone chemistry and the radiation balance.
• Tropical cyclones (TC): Rapidly rotating storms with an organized system of clouds and thunderstorms that form over tropical or subtropical waters.
• Tropospheric ozone: Ozone found in the troposphere, which acts as a greenhouse gas and air pollutant.
• Total Column Water Vapor (TCWV): The total amount of water vapor in the atmospheric column, a key indicator of the hydrological cycle.
• Vegetation Optical Depth (VOD): An indicator of vegetation density and structure that reflects changes in its health and growth.
• Vertical wind shear: The change in wind speed or direction with height in the atmosphere, which is an important factor in the development of tropical cyclones.
• Wet-Bulb Temperature (Tw): A measure of "damp heat" that combines air temperature and humidity.
• Western North Pacific (WNP) Basin: One of the most active areas in the world for tropical cyclones (typhoons).