A catastrophic 2 degrees above pre-industrial temperatures

 This was never supposed to happen.  Yet here we are.  Yes, I know it was only for 2 days, so far.   Nevertheless ....

From Axios.

The planet likely briefly exceeded a key warming threshold on Friday and Saturday for the first time since at least the beginning of instrument records, new data shows.

The indication that Friday and Saturday were the first two days on record to have a global average surface temperature above 2°C when compared with preindustrial levels, emerged first from a dataset maintained by the European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF)."Our best estimate is that this was the first day when global temperature was more than 2°C above 1850-1900 (or pre-industrial) levels, at 2.06°C," Samantha Burgess, the deputy director of the Copernicus Climate Change Service stated on X, formerly known as Twitter, on Sunday.

She also noted the Saturday record in a post on Monday, stating: "Now two Nov 2023 days where global temperature exceeded 2°C in ERA5."

When compared with the 1991-2020 average, Friday's global mean was a record-setting 1.17°C (2.1°F) above average.

In a post on X on Monday, the ECMWF found that Friday was a bit warmer, at 2.07°C above preindustrial levels, while Saturday reached an anomaly of 2.06°C.

A daily global average surface temperature climb to greater than 2°C above pre-industrial levels indicates just how quickly the planet is warming, including some of the extremes that are now possible.

Breaching the 2-degree threshold for two days does not mean that the Paris Agreement's target of holding global warming to "well below" such a mark has been exceeded. The agreement refers to the long-term average over two or more decades rather than one day, month or even year.

[However,] news of the record is in keeping with the record-shattering year so far.  This year is on track to be the hottest on record globally in all surface weather datasets and saw both the hottest month on record (September) but also the largest margin for any monthly record in history.

Each month since May has set monthly global temperature records, and heat waves have scorched large parts of the globe, from the Southern U.S. to Africa, South America, China and Japan.

Last summer, the global average surface temperature first rose into record territory and eclipsed the 1.5-degree Paris target. That caught some scientists off guard, and the failure of the planet to cool back down below all-time record territory has stood out.

November, too, is now likely to be the hottest such month on record.