Hiking in Mallorca's Tramuntana Mountains

Hiking in the mountains wouldn't have been a great idea at times last month. | Elena Ballestero

Andrew EdePalma11/08/2023 07:41
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The Aemet met agency has confirmed that this July in the Balearics was the hottest since records began. The average temperature for the islands was 27.3C, an anomaly of +2.4 degrees. In Mallorca specifically, the average was 27.2, also with a variation from the norm of plus 2.4.

What is particularly striking about data from weather stations for the month is that the greatest anomalies were registered in the Tramuntana Mountains. In Lluc, the average variation for July was +3.8 degrees. At the Serra Alfabia weather station in Bunyola, the anomaly was 3.2 degrees. These were the only examples in the Balearics where there was a difference of three degrees or more.

Aemet has classified July at weather stations in the mountains as "extremely hot", a classification shared with the likes of Sa Pobla, where there was an anomaly of +2.7 and the month's highest temperature was recorded - 43.9C on the eighteenth of July. This was an all-time high record for the Sa Pobla weather station.

Although it was a hot month, Aemet notes that the two heat waves during the month were only of three and four days' duration. Last summer, heat waves lasted longer. So far in August there haven't been any, a general cooling of temperatures since July probably explaining why the average sea temperature has dropped. At times in July, this was almost three degrees above average. On Thursday it was 26.72C, slightly under one degree higher than average.