Arctic News: Record high sea surface temperature causing global devastation

Wednesday, August 26, 2026

Record high sea surface temperature causing global devastation

On August 24, 2026, the sea surface temperature was 21.11°C or 70°F, the highest temperature on record and 0.68°C or 1.224°F higher than 1991-2020, as illustrated by the image below. The map (top right) shows the August 24, 2026, sea surface temperature versus 1991-2020.

The record high sea surface temperature is having a devastating impact, with extreme weather events occurring around the world. The outlook is that things will get even worse, since the 2026 El Niño is on track to increase in strength in the course of 2026 and become the strongest El Niño on record.

On August 25, 2026, the global sea ice area was 15.75 million km², the lowest on record for that day and a deviation of -4.70σ, as illustrated by the above image. The year 2026 is highlighted in black, the year 2025 is highlighted in blue and the years 2023 and 2024 are highlighted in purple.

Arctic sea ice is in a bad shape. The image below shows Arctic sea ice concentration on August 25, 2026, by the University of Bremen (left) and NSIDC (right).

Antarctic sea ice is also in a bad shape. The image below shows Antarctic sea ice concentration on August 25, 2026, by the University of Bremen (left) and NSIDC (right).

As El Niño increases in strength, global sea ice area looks set to get lower and lower in the course of 2026, while feedbacks, including albedo loss, lower clouds loss and increases in water vapor, are kicking in with greater ferocity, further contributing to acceleration of the temperature rise.

Conclusion

The situation is dire and unacceptably dangerous, and the precautionary principle necessitates the danger to be acknowledged, while facilitating rapid, comprehensive and effective action to reduce the damage and to improve the outlook, where needed in combination with a Climate Emergency Declaration, as described in posts such as in this 2022 post and this 2025 post, and as discussed in the Climate Plan group.