Schwerin/Offenbach (dpa/mv) – Despite a heat record in mid-July, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania got through the nationwide hot and dry summer month comparatively moderately. As reported by the German Weather Service (DWD) on Friday, the average temperature in the northeast was 18.3 degrees Celsius. With a July average for all of Germany of 19.2 degrees, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania was the “second coolest” federal state, according to the DWD.

Only the neighbors in Schleswig-Holstein had a slightly lower monthly average of 17.3 degrees. The DWD determined the highest average temperature for Saarland at 20.9 degrees. The heat record for Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania has held since July 20 in Boizenburg on the Elbe, where 39.4 degrees Celsius was measured on the hottest day of the year so far. Even on the Baltic Sea beach, with over 38 degrees, you worked up a sweat that day.

The drought was also less pronounced in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania than in other parts of Germany. Although the average rainfall of 45 liters per square meter was a third below the multi-year average for July, in Rhineland-Palatinate, for example, it was just 10 liters per square meter.

As reported by the German Weather Service, July 2022 in Germany was overall too warm, significantly too dry and very sunny. According to an initial evaluation, the average temperature was 2.3 degrees above the internationally valid reference value for the years 1961 to 1990. Even compared to the warmer reference period from 1991 to 2020, the deviation was still 0.9 degrees. “Drought and heat were the basis for numerous field and forest fires,” said the DWD. Fire brigades in Brandenburg and Saxony were still fighting flames on Friday.