U.S. scientists officially declare 2016 the hottest year on record.

[Cigar]

That makes three in a row folks.



In a powerful testament to the warming of the planet, two leading U.S. science agencies Wednesday jointly declared 2016 the hottest year on record, surpassing the previous record set just last year which, itself, had topped a record set in 2014.

Average surface temperatures in 2016, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, were 0.07 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than 2015, and featured eight successive months (January through August) that were individually the warmest since the agencys record began in 1880.

The average temperature across the worlds land and ocean surfaces was 58.69 Fahrenheit, or 1.69 degrees above the 20th century average of 57 degrees, NOAA declared. The agency also noted that the record for the global temperature has now successively been broken five times since the year 2000. The years 2005 and 2010 were also record warm years, according to the agencys dataset.

NASA concurred with NOAA, also declaring 2016 the warmest year on record in its own dataset that tracks the temperatures at the surface of the planets land and oceans, and expressing greater than 95 percent certainty in that conclusion. The agency noted that just since the year 2001 the planet has seen 16 of the 17 warmest years on record.


Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...rld%252Bnation

[Common]

Were all going to die, so what else is new people been dieing of something forever

[Cigar]

Earth Sets a Temperature Record for the Third Straight Year





Source: NY Times

Marking another milestone for a changing planet, scientists reported on Wednesday that the Earth reached its highest temperature on record in 2016 — trouncing a record set only a year earlier, which beat one set in 2014. It is the first time in the modern era of global warming data that temperatures have blown past the previous record three years in a row.

The findings come two days before the inauguration of an American president who has called global warming a Chinese plot and vowed to roll back his predecessor’s efforts to cut emissions of heat-trapping gases.

The data show that politicians cannot wish the problem away. The Earth is heating up, a point long beyond serious scientific dispute, but one becoming more evident as the records keep falling. Temperatures are heading toward levels that many experts believe will pose a profound threat to both the natural world and to human civilization.

In 2015 and 2016, the planetary warming was intensified by the weather pattern known as El Niño, in which the Pacific Ocean released a huge burst of energy and water vapor into the atmosphere. But the bigger factor in setting the records was the long-term trend of rising temperature, which scientists say is being driven by increasing levels of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/18/science/earth-highest-temperature-record.html?hpw&rref=science&action=click&pgtype=H omepage&module=well-region®ion=bottom-well&WT.nav=bottom-well&_r=0

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Time to switch to better stuff like solar and wind coupled with better lithium batteries.

[Cigar]

Were all going to die, so what else is new people been dieing of something forever

... and then we required Seat-belts in all Automobiles

[waltky]

It didn't snow in Chicago...

Study: Climate Change Goosed Odds of Freakishly Hot February in US
March 08, 2017 | WASHINGTON — A freakishly balmy February broke more than 11,700 local daily records for warmth in the United States, but it didn't quite beat 1954 for the warmest February on record, climate scientists said.

The average temperature last month was 41.2 degrees - 7.3 degrees warmer than normal but three-tenths a degree behind the record, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reported Wednesday. It was unseasonably toasty for most of the country east of the Rockies, but a cool Pacific Northwest kept the national record from falling, said NOAA climate scientist Jake Crouch. Chicago had no snow. Oklahoma hit 99 degrees. Texas and Louisiana had their hottest February. NOAA said local weather stations broke or tied warm temperature records 11,743 times but set cold records only 418 times.

Daffodils bloom in New York's Central Park, Feb. 28, 2017. Meteorologists say a freakishly warm February broke more than 11,700 local daily records but not a 1954 record for the nation’s warmest.

An international science team's computer analysis of causes of extreme weather calculated that man-made global warming tripled the likelihood for the nation's unusually warm February. The mostly private team of researchers, called World Weather Attribution, uses accepted scientific techniques to figure if climate change plays a role in extreme events based on computer simulations of real world conditions and those without heat-trapping gases. “I don't recall ever seeing a February like this,” said Princeton University climate scientist Gabe Vecchi, who was part of the quick attribution study that was not peer reviewed. “We expect this to happen with more and more frequency over time.”

‘The new climate normal’

Several outside scientists praised the quick study, including Pennsylvania State University meteorology professor David Titley, who was on a National Academy of Sciences panel that certified the accuracy of climate change attribution science. “This is the new climate normal that we all need to come to grips with,” Titley said. “And it's stunning how quickly our climate has changed.” Natural random weather variations and climate change combined to make it a weird February, meteorologists said. Overall, NOAA said it was the sixth warmest U.S. winter on record, about 3.7 degrees warmer than the 20th century average. “You definitely do feel that this is going to be something that you get to enjoy now and you pay for after the fact,” said Vecchi, who was biking in short-sleeves in New Jersey last month.

Oklahoma University meteorology professor Jason Furtado said he worries that the lack of deep Arctic cold plunges in February means the Gulf of Mexico never cooled down. And when severe weather season in the spring starts, the moisture coming north from warmer Gulf waters will goose outbreaks and increase the probability of nasty spring storms and tornadoes. Massachusetts already had an unprecedented February tornado. A March frost could kill early blooming trees and flowers and the lack of a proper winter could lead to more mosquitoes and ticks this year, Vecchi said. “What is lurking behind the corner while we're outside throwing a Frisbee might be looking to make our lives less pleasant,” he said.

Study: Climate Change Goosed Odds of Freakishly Hot February in US

[Common Sense]

It's been the warmest winter I can remember. No snow accumulation this winter at all. At least not here.

[Casper]

It's been the warmest winter I can remember. No snow accumulation this winter at all. At least not here.

We had our hottest February ever her in North Texas and everything is blooming waaay early. Thinking we are going to get some sort of insect plague again here, had crickets a few years ago, I used to like crickets at one time, no more.

[Peter1469]

We almost had our warmest February. 1976 still has the top spot.

[Starman]

Earth Sets a Temperature Record for the Third Straight Year

Time to switch to better stuff like solar and wind coupled with better lithium batteries.

1. NOAA has been fighting tooth and nail, refusing to hand over emails between its scientists, as demanded by congressmen looking for coverups and manipulation of so-called "scientific" information paid for by taxpayers, amounting to billions of dollars. If they're squeeky clean, why are they not cooperating and showing their emails? Clearly, they're a bunch of liars and crooks.
As Democrats said a few decades ago, "What did they know and when did they know it?"

2. Solar, and wind, and lithium batteries should get us to the 7 newly discovered exoplanets right? Just tape all the solar panels on the outside of the space shuttle, fill 'er' up with lithium batteries, and as the ship accelerates, drop propellers outside to generate even MORE electricity. Then when we get to the 7 newly discovered planets... in, oh, 50,000 years or so, that will be so cool! And profitable too.

3. I'm just wondering... did Barack and Michelle use those solar and wind sources to fly from Palm Springs to their rich friend's estate in the Caribbean? No? Oh my. The polar bears are dying in greater numbers now.

[waltky]

Granny says, 'Dats right - we're like frogs inna kettle...

Last Three Years Hottest on Record, UN Report Says March 21, 2018 — The past three years were the hottest on record and heat waves in Australia, freak Arctic warmth and water shortages in Cape Town are extending harmful weather extremes in 2018, the United Nations said on Thursday.

Atlantic hurricanes and monsoon floods in India contributed to make 2017 the most costly year on record for severe weather and climate events, the U.N.'s World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) wrote in its annual report on the global climate. “The start of 2018 has continued where 2017 left off” with extreme weather claiming lives and destroying livelihoods,” WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas wrote in the report. The study confirmed a provisional finding that 2016 was the warmest year in records dating back to the 19th century, with 2017 and 2015 tied for second place in a warming trend the WMO blames on man-made emissions of greenhouse gases.

This Oct. 31, 2012 file aerial photo shows a collapsed house along the central Jersey Shore coast. Polling shows that a clear majority of mayors are prepared to confront President Donald Trump's administration over climate change.

Last year was the hottest year without an extra boost from an El Nino event that releases heat from the Pacific Ocean. Taalas said unusually high temperatures in the Arctic in 2018 contrasted with bitter winter storms in Europe and North America. Also so far in 2018, “Australia and Argentina suffered extreme heat waves, whilst drought continued in Kenya and Somalia, and the South African city of Cape Town struggled with acute water shortages,” he said. The report said that German reinsurer Munich Re estimated total disaster losses from weather and climate-related events in 2017 at $320 billion, a record after adjustment for inflation. In 2015, almost 200 nations agreed to shift the global economy away from fossil fuels this century as part of the Paris climate agreement. U.S. President Donald Trump, who doubts that man-made greenhouse gas emissions are the prime cause of warming, has said he will withdraw from the pact, and instead promote domestic coal, gas and oil. The WMO said that levels of carbon dioxide were now above 400 parts per million of the atmosphere — far above natural variations in the past 800,000 years and backing up mainstream scientific findings that mankind is the cause. Carbon dioxide “will remain above that level for generations to come, committing our planet to a warmer future, with more weather, climate and water extremes,” Taalas said. https://www.voanews.com/a/un-reports...d/4309835.html