Researchers have confirmed that record temperatures were recorded in the summer of 2024 in the seas around Greece, making it the hottest in forty years. The researchers, studying data from satellite observations from 1982 onwards, found that during the summer of 2024, the warmest conditions in the last forty years occurred across the entire Aegean, Ionian and Cretan Seas.

What is worrying scientists is that the increase in temperature is not only found at superficial sea depths but extends to over 50 metres down in some marine regions, resulting in a major detrimental impact on ecosystems.

Also, warmer seas feed atmospheric heat waves, leading to the more intense weather experienced in the Mediterranean during last summer.