Wild weather warning as study finds oceans at their hottest in 1000 years

dailyrecord.co.uk:

The world’s oceans are likely the hottest they’ve been for 1,000 years and are set to bring about even wilder weather events, new analysis has found.

An international team of scientists said the planet’s waters were the warmest ever recorded in 2022, posing a massive threat to coral reefs and marine life around the world.

And with the oceans thought to be at their hottest levels in a millennium - and heating faster than any time in the last 2,000 years - it raises the risk of more intense hurricanes, typhoons, rainfall and flooding.More than 90 per cent of excess heat trapped by greenhouse gases is absorbed in the oceans, with temperatures rising steadily since 1958 before shooting up quicker post-1990.Hotter oceans help supercharge extreme weather and lead to more moisture in the air, bringing more intense rains and flooding.

Water also expands when it warms, pushing up sea levels. The analysis, published in the journal Advances in Atmospheric Sciences, said: “The Earth’s energy and water cycles have been profoundly altered due to the emission of greenhouse gases by human activities, driving pervasive changes in Earth’s climate system.“There are increasing occurrences of record-shattering heatwaves and droughts in the northern hemisphere, consistent with intensive ocean warming in the mid-latitude Pacific and Atlantic oceans.”Study team member Prof John Abraham, of the University of St Thomas in Minnesota, said: “If you want to measure global warming, you want to measure where the warming goes, and over 90 per cent goes into the oceans.“Measuring the oceans is the most accurate way of determining how out of balance our planet is.“We are getting more extreme weather because of the warming oceans and that has tremendous