February was warmest on record for England and Wales

Last month was the warmest February on record in England and Wales, the Met Office national weather service said on Friday, pointing to the impact of human-induced climate change on winter temperatures in Britain.

England’s average temperature last month was 7.5 degrees Celsius (45.5 Fahrenheit), topping a record of 7 C set in 1990. In Wales, the average temperature of 6.9 C in February was slightly ahead of a 1998 record.

The UK as a whole experienced its second warmest February, averaging 6.3 C, below a record set in 1998, the Met Office said, based on weather records dating back to 1884.

The Met Office said in January that the UK experienced its second-warmest year on record in 2023, just behind 2022.

The agency said it was seeing a clear trend of warming winter temperatures and predicted it would continue due to the impact of human-induced climate change.

“The UK’s observations clearly show winters are getting warmer, and they are also getting wetter since as the atmosphere heats up, it has an increased capacity to hold moisture,” Met Office Senior Scientist Mike Kendon said.

Global temperatures have been rising. The European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service confirmed in January that 2023 was the planet’s hottest on record by a substantial margin and was probably the warmest in the last 100,000 years.