NASA Earth Observatory image by Lauren Dauphin, using the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment Follow On (GRACE-FO) data from the National Drought Mitigation Center. Edited from story by Michael Carlowicz, with assistance from Matt Rodell (NASA Goddard Space Flight Center).
The winter of 2019–2020 was the warmest on record in Europe, with little snow. The spring was also drier and warmer than normal, with a historic heat wave in the middle of May. The forecast for summer 2020 did not look much better. For the third year in a row, Europe faced water woes. Drought conditions started in eastern Europe in early spring 2020 and migrated across the continent with drier-than-normal weather. And all of this occurred as 2020 continued to be one of the hottest years on record globally. The map shows shallow groundwater storage. June 22, 2020.