U.S. experiences warmest 12-month period on record--again
Thanks in part to the historic heat wave that demolished thousands of high temperature records at the end of June, temperatures in the contiguous U.S. were the warmest on record over the past twelve months and for the year-to-date period of January - June, said NOAA's National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) on Monday. June 2012 was the 14th warmest June on record, so was not as extreme overall as March 2012 (first warmest March on record), April (third warmest April), or May (second warmest May.) However, temperatures were warm enough in June to set a new U.S. record for hottest 12-month period for the third straight month, narrowly eclipsing the record set just the previous month. The past thirteen months have featured America's 2nd warmest summer (in 2011), 4th warmest winter, and warmest spring on record. Twenty-six states were record warm for the 12-month period, and an additional sixteen states were top-ten warm. The year-to-date period of January - June was the warmest on record by an unusually large margin--1.2°F.
Figure 1. This time series shows the five warmest years that the contiguous U.S. has experienced, and how the year-to-date temperature evolved each month throughout those years. The time series also shows the 2012 year-to-date temperature through June, which was the warmest first half of any year on record for the lower 48. The 2012 data are still preliminary. Image credit: NOAA/NCDC.
Figure 2. Four of the top-ten warmest 12-month periods in the contiguous U.S. since 1895 have occurred since April 2011. Image credit: NOAA/NCDC.
Most extreme January - June period on record
NOAA's U.S. Climate Extremes Index (CEI), which tracks the percentage area of the contiguous U.S. experiencing top-10% and bottom-10% extremes in temperature, precipitation, and drought, was 44% during the year-to-date January - June period. This is the highest value since CEI record-keeping began in 1910, and more than twice the average value. Remarkably, 83% of the contiguous U.S. had maximum temperatures that were in the warmest 10% historically during the first six months of 2012, and 70% of the U.S. of the U.S. had warm minimum temperatures in the top 10%. The percentage area of the U.S. experiencing top-10% drought conditions was 20%, which was the 14th greatest since 1910. Extremes in 1-day spring heavy precipitation events were near average.
Figure 3. NOAA's U.S. Climate Extremes Index (CEI) for January - June shows that 2012 has had the most extreme first six months of the year on record, with 44% of the contiguous U.S. experiencing top-10% extreme weather.
Tuesday Webinar on the future of extreme weather impacts on business
I'm presenting a 12-minute Webinar talk on the future of weather-related disasters at 2 pm EDT Tuesday July 10. If you want to register (it's free) and listen in, visit the propertycasualty360.com web site. The title of the webinar is, "The Year-Round CAT Season: Is Your Business Prepared for Increasingly Frequent Severe Weather?"
"New McCarthyism" targets climate scientists
Bill Blakemore with ABC News has an interesting five-part interview with climate scientist Dr. Michael Mann, where Dr. Mann explains how a "New McCarthyism" is targeting climate scientists. I reviewed Dr. Mann's excellent book, "The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars", earlier this year.
A 1 in 1.6 million event?
I originally wrote in this post that "Each of the 13 months from June 2011 through June 2012 ranked among the warmest third of their historical distribution for the first time in the 1895 - present record. According to NCDC, the odds of this occurring randomly during any particular month are 1 in 1,594,323. Thus, we should only see one more 13-month period so warm between now and 124,652 AD--assuming the climate is staying the same as it did during the past 118 years."
It has been pointed out to me that the calculation of a 1 in 1.6 million chance of occurrence (based on taking the number 1/3 and raising it to the 13th power) would be true only if each month had no correlation to the next month. Since weather patterns tend to persist, they are not truly random from one month to the next. Thus, the odds of such an event occurring are greater than 1 in 1.6 million--but are still very rare. I appreciate hearing from those of you who wrote to point out a correction was needed.
Jeff Masters
Reader Comments
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Which would make sense considering its proximity to a ULL (providing lift) and divergent flow aloft (providing ventilation). That doesn't mean it is anything worthy of special note.
Station FWYF1
NDBC
Location: 25.591N 80.097W
Date: Wed, 11 Jul 2012 13:00:00 UTC
Winds: NE (40°) at 11.1 kt gusting to 13.0 kt
Atmospheric Pressure: 30.05 in and rising
Air Temperature: 75.2 F
Water Temperature: 84.6 F
Just east of Key Largo:
Station MLRF1
NDBC
Location: 25.012N 80.376W
Date: Wed, 11 Jul 2012 13:00:00 UTC
Winds: NE (40°) at 13.0 kt gusting to 14.0 kt
Atmospheric Pressure: 30.05 in and rising
Air Temperature: 77.4 F
Water Temperature: 82.8 F
View Details - View History
I guess the science loses this morning.
See Yall Later................... :)
14.3n115.1w - 14.5n116.2w has been re-evalutated&altered
14.2n115.1w - 14.5n116.2w - 14.7n117.0w are now the most recent positions
Its vector had changed from 12.7mph(20.5km/h) WNWest to 9.2mph(14.8km/h) WNWest
MaxSusWinds had had held steady at 90knots(104mph)167km/h
And minimum pressure had held steady at 970millibars
For those who like to visually track H.Emilia's path...
OGG is Kahului :: ITO is Hilo :: SAN is SanDiego ::CSL is CaboSanLucas
Easternmost dot on the connected line-segments is where TropicalStormEmilia became H.Emilia
Westernmost dot on the connected line-segments is HurricaneEmilia's most recent position
The longest line is a straightline projection thru H.Emilias's 2 most recent positions to the coastline
10July6pmGMT: H.Emilia had been headed toward passing over ParadisePark
11July12amGMT: H.Emilia had been headed toward passing 217miles(349kilometres) north of Kauai
(Closest passage at 25.369n159.021w. Not shown due to map scale)
11July6amGMT: H.Emilia had been headed toward passing over Pe'ahi,Maui
11July12pmGMT: H.Emilia was heading toward passing 1.1miles(1.7kilometres) North of TheBigIsland
in ~11days15hours
Copy&paste ogg, 19.624n154.949w, 25.369n159.021w, 20.943n156.279w, ito, 8.8n156.2w, san, csl, 12.0n108.7w-12.4n109.4w, 12.4n109.4w-12.8n110.5w, 12.8n110.5w-13.2n111.7w, 13.2n111.7w-13.4n112.5w, 13.4n112.5w-13.6n113.3w, 13.6n113.3w-13.8n114.1w, 13.8n114.1w-14.2n115.1w, 14.2n115.1w-14.5n116.2w, 14.5n116.2w-14.7n117.0w, 14.5n116.2w-20.284n155.85w, 20.268n155.85w-20.284n155.85w into the GreatCircleMapper for more information
The previous mapping for comparison
Dis is B-A-D Mojo,
No GCM I'm aware of ignores clouds, nor are scientists ignorant of what kinds of feedbacks can result from clouds in the future.
What makes clouds so difficult is that, for the most part, clouds are very small scale phenomena, and even the highest resolution coupled models can only capture the larger events. The other problem is that clouds are a meteorological phenomena and depend greatly on the prevailing conditions, terrain, etc. so any cloud component of such models usually have error bars associated with them.
This is why scientists do thousands of runs with these models using slight variations of parameters to get a good feel about where the climate is going. And depending on where and how often the clouds form, they can have cooling or a warming effect. And even if they have a warming or cooling effect that does not imply that the planet will get warmer or cooler, as clouds are just one part of these models. It is not simply "more clouds == more cooling" like certain internet personalities would like you to believe.
And even if the models say something is going to happen does not mean the scientists automatically assume it will. The models are a result of science, not vice versa. The models are tools that can help provide insight into the climate system. They are not the end-all, be-all of climate science, and no credible climate scientist would ever claim such a thing.
The climate is not simple. In a number of cases, it isn't even intuitive. There is a considerable amount of advanced physics and mathematics that go into climate science; math and science that are used in a number of other fields. A skeptic understands the math and science, and attempts to find weaknesses and holes in the prevailing science using rigor and analysis. Deniers would have you believe that they can rip apart scientific results using grade school math and excel spreadsheets.
Some on here don't get it Pat. This systems can form fast in the area especially with steering favoring a Rita or K track.
Well within range? According to who?
Resolute, Canada was in the 60's and 70's. That is well above normal for this time of year, or any time of year for that matter. Similar conditions existed across the arctic, where temperature anomalies where anywhere from 5 to 10+ degrees above normal. Further, SST anomalies are also indicate much above normal temperatures for a lot of the arctic.
And if you don't want to believe temperature and sensor measurements, then how about some visual imagery? MODIS imagery of the arctic shows the rapid melting, and clearly shows the fractured and slush like nature of the western half of the ice (which will soon be melting away completely.
Here's a site that shows you every metric you'd care to look at in regards to the arctic: Link .
It's quite likely we will see a new minimum extent this year, and pretty much certain that we will hit a new low for volume (the more important number). But you can continue pretending that nothing is happening.
This has been starting to make the rounds quickly already, I'm glad RealClimate addressed it. I've seen news articles already misunderstanding the conclusions or seeing what they want to see. It doesn't prove anything, it doesn't refute anything. As with any single study, it suggests; for this study it suggests a steeper natural warming trend since the Roman Warm Period than some other studies. Contrary to some poorer analysis, it actually suggests that the modern warming period halted and reversed a more substantial natural cooling, thus providing even more evidence for significance of our enhanced greenhouse effect.
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