The surge in SSTSST Sea Surface Temperatures that began in June has gradually been subsiding since the start of July, and now we’re starting to see some blue negative anomalies appear around the British Isles at last. What triggered this surge in SST’s is anyone’s guess. Perhaps a giant hydrothermal vent briefly opened on the mid-Atlantic ridge in the North Atlantic and spewed out an enormous amount of super-critically heated water for a couple of days? It may sound totally wacky, which it probably is, but there have been a number of hotspots that suddenly appear and disappear just as quickly in the last 10 years that I’ve been watching SST across the globe.
SST anomalies may have been falling across the Atlantic but they are still at record high level in the Mediterranean sea, particularly at the western end along the coast of north Africa.