First 6 months of 2016 hottest ever recorded

Ski fields are struggling to open and winter electricity consumption is down in New Zealand after the first six months of 2016 proved to be the hottest start to a year that scientists have ever recorded.

Temperatures in the South Pacific nation were 1.4 C above the long-term average for the first half of the year, according to the government-funded National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research.

That's the highest since record-keeping began more than a century ago, and significantly higher than the previous record of 1.1C above average, reached in 1938 and again in 1999.