🇨🇴Colombia

Colombia spans 4°13′S–12°26′N on the mainland as the only South American country with both Caribbean and Pacific coasts, dominated by the three-pronged Andes (Cordillera Occidental, Central, and Oriental) running south to north; its highest point, Pico Cristóbal Colón (about 5,700–5,775 m), rises in the isolated Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta.

This produces extreme thermal-floor stratification: tierra caliente below 1,000 m, templada 1,000–2,000 m, fría from 2,000 m to about 3,200–3,500 m, páramo and ice above. Köppen regimes include equatorial rainforest Af in the Pacific Chocó and Amazon basin (among the wettest regions on Earth), tropical savanna Aw across the Llanos and Caribbean lowlands, oceanic temperate Cfb in the Andean highlands (Bogotá), and tundra or ice-cap ET/EF on the high cordilleras and the few remaining tropical glaciers.

Bogotá at 2,640 m has highs of 19–20°C and nights of 8–10°C year-round with about 900 mm of rain; Medellín at 1,500 m enjoys a balmy eternal spring, with highs of 27–29°C and nights around 18°C; Cali is tropical, with highs around 30°C and nights around 19°C; Cartagena is hot Caribbean, with highs of 31–32°C and about 1,100 mm; Quibdó in the Chocó receives over 8,000 mm annually, the most of any South American city its size. Leticia in the southern Amazon records highs of 30–32°C and nights of 21–23°C with 3,400 mm; the Llanos savanna experiences a sharp April–November wet season.

ENSO produces marked inter-annual rainfall variations across Colombia, driving alternating wet and dry periods. Strong El Niño events generate drought conditions, as recorded in 2010 and 2015, while strong La Niña events generate increased flooding and trigger mass movement events, as in the deadly 2010–2011 rainy season; locally heavy rain also triggered the Mocoa mudslides of 2017.

The Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) and Caribbean low-level jet establish Colombia's regional rainfall patterns. Andean glaciers have undergone significant retreat in recent decades. Ongoing coastal erosion affects settlements including Cartagena and numerous communities in the Pacific lowlands.

Our archive covers 34 Colombian cities with daily ERA5 reanalysis data going back to 1940. The hottest July afternoons are in Cúcuta, with average highs around 34.7°C, while Zipaquirá has the coldest January nights, with average lows near 9.3°C. Comparing the last decade against the 1940–1970 baseline, mean temperatures across these cities have risen by about 1.7°C.