Europe 1 with AFP 15:43 p.m., July 31, 2023

If the temperature seems cool in some regions, July is the 18th consecutive month with temperatures above normal in France, announced Météo-France. Across the country, the temperature was "+0.8 degrees above normal". Heat records were broken in Saarlongue and Cannes.

These last few days may appear cool and gloomy in some regions, but July was nevertheless the 18th consecutive month with temperatures above normal in France, announced Monday Météo-France. "After a month of June very hot throughout the France and very sunny on the northern half, July 2023 leaves a feeling generally cool," but yet its balance is in fact "close to normal," said the institute of weather forecasts in a statement.

15th warmest July since 1900

Over the whole month and the country, the average temperature is expected to be "between 21.8 and 22 degrees, about +0.8 degrees above normal". It is even the 15th warmest July since 1900. And since February 2022, all months have been warmer than normal in France.

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Because even if in Brittany, Hauts-de-France or Champagne, temperatures were "very close to normal, even locally slightly cool", the month was mainly marked by scorching temperatures in the Mediterranean regions. Corsica went through its second longest heat wave since 1947 from July 8 to 24. The island experienced "one of its hottest July months" with July 2022 and 2015, with an average temperature of 24.9 degrees.

Absolute records for all months were also broken in Sarrelongue (Pyrénées-Orientales), with 40.4 degrees and Cannes (Alpes-Maritimes) with 39.2 degrees. In the rest of the country, temperatures were 1 to 2 degrees above normal.

Why the impression of a "rotten summer"?

But then why do some regions have the unpleasant impression of living a rotten summer? This is because after the summer of 2022, marked by three heat waves, we have somehow "gotten used to heat waves" and "completely unaccustomed to these wet and cool periods in the north of the France that were coming, even in the heart of summer," recalled climatologist Robert Vautard on France Info.

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"The memories we have are sometimes skewed by particular moments, and there we had a series of very hot summers between 2017 and 2020, and then last summer. We were no longer used to these cool sequences, but over time, it is normal to have rain or temperatures of 16 or 18 degrees even in summer in some regions. It's part of the temperate climate," explains François Gourand, forecaster at Météo-France.