🇧🇸Bahamas

The Bahamas lie between 20° and 28°N as an archipelago of roughly 700 low-lying islands built on fossil coral and limestone, in the Atlantic east of Florida, north of Cuba and northwest of Hispaniola, covering about 13,900 km² in total (about 10,000 km² of land) with the highest point only 63 m at Mount Alvernia on Cat Island.

The northern islands (Grand Bahama, the Abacos) have cooler winters, while the southern chain, including Inagua, is warmer and drier. The warm Gulf Stream and the western North Atlantic moderate temperatures year-round, while persistent east and northeast trade winds sweep the islands with maritime air.

Nassau sees January lows around 18°C and August highs around 33°C, with annual rainfall around 1,400 mm concentrated in the May-to-October wet season. The southern islands are markedly drier (Inagua receives under 700 mm per year) and rainfall variability is high throughout the archipelago.

The Atlantic hurricane season from June through November dominates climate hazards: severe direct strikes include Hurricane Andrew in 1992, Floyd in 1999, and most severely Dorian in 2019, a Category 5 storm that stalled over Abaco and Grand Bahama, killing 74 people and inflicting USD 3.4 billion in damage. Freshwater resources are very limited, and rising sea levels threaten virtually the entire nation given a median elevation below 10 meters.

Comparing the last decade against the 1940–1970 baseline, mean temperatures across these cities have risen by about 0.8°C.