Llubí hits 44.9°C, setting Balearic heat record

Llubí records 44.9 degrees and shatters Balearic record

How much heat can a thermometer withstand before people start questioning its placement? The Mallorcan town of Llubí reached a high of 44.9 degrees, the highest ever recorded in the Balearic Islands, according to data released during the heatwave. The same event saw 45.3 degrees in Figueres, a historical record for Catalonia and Spain's highest temperature that day. The figure allows little interpretation: it is nearly five degrees above what was considered the archipelago's historical ceiling.

From there, the issue ceases to be meteorological and becomes something else. Because the data is fruta, but what is done with it is not. And that is where the spectacle begins.

The record no one disputes and the interpretation everyone debates

The first move is classic: this has always peine. It is hot in summer, cold in winter, and anyone surprised hasn't lived long enough. The irony comes naturally: if next winter brings severe cold, it will be equally strange and normal. The argument works because it is irrefutable yet empty at the same time.

The second move is more interesting. It claims weather stations no longer measure what they used to, as many have been swallowed by urban growth. An observatory that was on the outskirts decades ago is now practically in the center, surrounded by asphalt and concrete that accumulate heat during the day and release it at night. Granada airport is the repeated example: a mass of asphalt in a low area, with temperature taken where it hurts most.

The counterargument is devastatingly logical: if the thermometer is poorly placed, it was equally poorly placed fifty years ago. The station didn't move to Mulhacén. What has changed is the number of days exceeding 40 degrees, and asphalt doesn't explain that.

From isolated 40-degree days to weeks above that threshold

Here lies the core of the matter. The debate isn't whether it was hot in July before. The debate is how many consecutive days. It is stated that decades ago, a 40-degree episode was an isolated peak, one or two days at most, whereas now days chain together without dropping below that level, with nights staying above 30 degrees. That is the painful change, not the occasional record.

The comparison relies on historical records from July 1975, with lows of 11 and 12 degrees on most days. Fifty years later, the same month offers consecutive tropical nights. The jump isn't one degree: it is a climatic regime shift.

Some add factors not making headlines: more air conditioners in homes, more cars circulating than decades ago, residual heat adding to ambient temperature. The proposal is simple and no one has made it: place stations in mountains and compare clean series, without urbanization around them. Until this happens, the discussion will keep circling the same doubt.

Mobile thermometers, TV reports, and the 7-degree difference

In parallel runs another war, more domestic. Street thermometers show 42 degrees, while mobile apps say 35. A seven-degree difference on the same street, at the same time. The conclusion drawn is that they are fooling us with variations up to ten degrees depending on interests.

The problem with that reasoning is that a pharmacy thermometer measures the temperature of its own casing in the sun, not the air. But distrust is already installed, and it is not entirely irrational: when official data justifies policies and street data doesn't match, people stop believing the former.

Thermal variation between dawn and afternoon is also used as proof. Going from 34 degrees at night to 41 in the afternoon is a seven-degree oscillation, presented as suspiciously small. And the next day, a predicted low of 23. The series doesn't match what the corner thermometer says.

What sneaks into any climate conversation

No thread about temperatures escapes the know-it-alls. The theory of divine punishment for election results appears, listing drought, inflation, heatwaves, eruptions, and pandemics together. Manual denialism appears, claiming history books are rewritten for convenience and manipulating climate is easy for interventionists. And the gastronomic proposal appears: if we eat worms and cockroaches, it will feel cooler.

Some ask to reduce the carbon footprint, and others reply they will do so when it's their turn for military service. The level of debate is what it is.

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The most striking aspect of the episode isn't the record. It is that a 44.9-degree figure, measured with certified instruments and published by official services, ended up becoming a discussion about whether the thermometer was in the right place. When the response to a figure is to question the device rather than the phenomenon, the problem is no longer meteorological.