Sharjah24 – AFP: Human-caused climate change made this summer's drought across the Northern Hemisphere at least 20 times more likely, according to a rapid analysis released Wednesday that warns such extreme dry periods will become increasingly common with global heating.

The three months from June-August were the hottest in Europe since records began, and the exceptionally high temperatures led to the worst drought the continent has witnessed since the Middle Ages.

Crops withered in European breadbaskets, as the historic dry spell drove record wildfire intensity and placed severe pressure on the continent's power grid.

Successive heatwaves between June and July, which saw temperatures top 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) in Britain for the first time, saw some 24,000 excess deaths in Europe.

China and North America also experienced unusually high temperatures and exceptionally low rainfall over the period.

An international team of climate scientists have determined the warming caused by human activity made such extreme weather significantly more likely than it would have been at the dawn of the industrial age.

The World Weather Attribution service calculated that the agricultural and ecological drought over the Northern Hemisphere was at least 20 times likelier thanks to global heating.