UN weather agency affirms 2020 Arctic heat record in Siberia

FILE A man rides his bicycle through smoke from a forest fire covers Yakutsk, the capital of the republic of Sakha also known as Yakutia, Russia Far East, Russia, Thursday, Aug. 12, 2021. The U.N. weather agency has certified a 38-degree Celsius (100.4 Fahrenheit) reading in the Russian town of Verkhoyansk last year as the highest temperature ever recorded in the Arctic. The World Meteorological Organization said the temperature "more befitting the Mediterranean than the Arctic" was recorded in June 2020 during a heat wave that swept across Siberia and stretched north of the Arctic Circle. Average temperatures were up to 10 degrees Celsius more than usual in Arctic Siberia. (AP Photo/Ivan Nikiforov, File)