Heat wave in Russia brings record-breaking temperatures north of Arctic Circle

A heat wave in Russia brought record-breaking temperatures to cities north of the Arctic Circle.

You may think of Russia -- especially the northern areas from St. Petersburg to Moscow and into Siberia -- as one of the coldest places on Earth, but that was certainly not the case the past few days. Daily temperatures in St. Petersburg rose to a record-breaking 34 degrees Celsius (93 degrees Fahrenheit) on Tuesday as the city faced the hottest temperatures it's seen since 1998. In Siberia on Sunday, the land surface temperature, which measures how hot the surface feels when you touch it, exceeded 35 degrees Celsius (95 degrees Fahrenheit), with peaks of 48 degrees Celsius (118 degrees Fahrenheit) near Verkhoyansk, and 37 degrees Celsius (nearly 99 degrees Fahrenheit) in Saskylah, both of which are north of the Arctic Circle. In Saskylah, an air temperature, which is what people actually feel when they walk outside, of 31.9 degrees Celsius (almost 90 degrees Fahrenheit) was recorded, the highest value since 1936.