Thursday July 18th … Dear Diary. The main purpose of this ongoing blog will be to track United States extreme or record temperatures related to climate change. Any reports I see of ETs will be listed below the main topic of the day. I’ll refer to extreme or record temperatures as ETs (not extraterrestrials).😉
Major U.S. Heat Wave Day Three + Climate Central Global Checkup
The next three days, Thursday through Saturday, will be the hottest period of the current heatwave roasting the nation from the Rockies through the East Coast. Before we detail some of the latest information on that I want to post a short report that I just received from Climate Central, encapsulating both global and national highlights for 2019, so far. By the way, can you believe that this year is half over?
2019 Global Temperatures Through June: Among Top 5 Hottest on Record
- Published: July 18th, 2019
Following today’s release of NOAA’s monthly global temperature analysis, it’s time to look back at the first half of 2019. Using re-baselined NOAA and NASA data, we find that this year is on pace to be the 3rd hottest on record globally—a ranking that would maintain the most recent five years as the hottest five on record. While U.S. heat hasn’t been as extreme this year, record rainfall has plagued the country for months.
Across the world, this year has been loaded with record high temperatures. Here are a few highlights:
- Last month was the hottest June on record—both for Europe and for the globe (NASA data — beating 2016 by about 0.2°F).
- Anchorage shattered its previous temperature record by 5 degrees—in a year that has had near-unprecedented melting of Arctic sea ice as well.
- Australia suffered its hottest summer on record, causing blackouts and mass deaths of native wildlife.
- Nationwide record highs were set in several countries, from France and Angola to Cuba and Vietnam.
Human sources of greenhouse gas emissions are also at an all-time high. Those emissions add to the thickening blanket of heat-trapping gases in the atmosphere, turning recent years record-hot. Even small changes in average temperature can greatly magnify extremes. According to World Weather Attribution, climate change made Europe’s recent heat wave at least five times more likely. Such extremes will happen more frequently and intensely as the climate warms, unless emissions are rapidly reduced.
While U.S. temperatures have been close to average this year, rain totals continue to break records. June capped the nation’s wettest 12 months on record—just as May and April had before. Not much has changed since our late May raincheck, as vast swaths of the Plains and West still exceed year-to-date averages by 50% or more. But Hurricane Barry has made matters worse for Louisiana, which has already seen one of the largest increases in annual precipitation. As higher temperatures supercharge the water cycle, stronger downpours will continue to amplify flood risks.
On the plus side, 2019 has also seen more local clean energy commitments, from cities and states to utilities. Steps like these are an important start in limiting the emissions that lead to warming.
METHODOLOGY: Monthly global temperature analyses are independently calculated by NASA and NOAA/NCEI. Climate Central combines the NOAA and NASA information to re-baseline global temperatures using an earlier pre-industrial baseline of 1881-1910 in response to the Paris Climate Change Agreement. NASA’s calculations are extended to account for temperature changes at the poles, where there are fewer stations. NOAA does not use any extrapolation to account for low station density at the poles.
As usual, any newer messages that cross my radar during Thursday will be listed at the top of this article. Check back from time to time to see if I have listed more:
Now back to our bakeathon. Here are some social media messages with article links on this ongoing heatwave:
This is about the biggest area of heat advisories and warnings that I have seen east of the Rockies since 2016:
Here is more climate and weather news from Friday:
(As usual, this will be a fluid post in which more information gets added during the day as it crosses my radar, crediting all who have put it on-line. Items will be archived on this site for posterity. In most instances click on the pictures of each tweet to see each article.)
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Guy Walton- “The Climate Guy”