Earth Has Its 2nd Warmest February and Warmest Northern Hemisphere Winter

February 2015 was the second warmest February since global record keeping began in 1880, said NOAA's National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) on Wednesday. NASA also rated February 2015 as the 2nd warmest February on record, behind February 1998 (which was exceptionally warm due to the super-El Niño going on at the time.) February 2015's near-record warmth continues a trend of very warm months for the planet--2014 was Earth's warmest calendar year on record, the period spanning the Northern Hemisphere winter (December 2014 - February 2015) was the warmest such period on record, and the past twelve months have been the warmest 12-month period in recorded history. Global ocean temperatures during February 2015 were the 3rd warmest on record, and global land temperatures were the 2nd warmest on record. Global satellite-measured temperatures in February 2015 for the lowest 8 km of the atmosphere were the 6th or 3rd warmest in the 37-year record, according to Remote Sensing Systems and the University of Alabama Huntsville (UAH), respectively.
 

Figure 1. Departure of temperature from average for February 2015, the 2nd warmest February for the globe since record keeping began in 1880.  Image credit: National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) .
 
No billion-dollar weather disasters in February 2015
No billion-dollar weather-related disasters hit the Earth during February 2015, according to the February 2015 Catastrophe Report from insurance broker Aon Benfield. February 2015 joins January 2015 and November 2014 as the only months since February 2012 to go without a billion-dollar weather disaster. However, damages from the series of winter storms and cold weather outbreaks that affected the eastern two-thirds of the U.S. during February killed 72 people and will likely add up to more than a billion dollars, Aon Benfield said.


Figure 2. The Alps of MIT: With more than 40 inches of snow blanketing the Boston area in a two week period in February 2015, snow removal efforts on the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge created this five-story-high mountain of snow. It was the coldest month (any month) on record for some sites in the Northeast, including Syracuse, NY:  9.1°F; old record 12.1° (Feb. 1934); Buffalo, NY:  10.9°F; old record 11.6° (Feb. 1934); Rochester, NY:  12.2°F, old record 12.6°F (Feb. 1934); Bangor, ME:  6.1°F, old record 8.4°F (Jan. 1994); Worcester, MA:  14.2°F; old record 14.4°F (Feb. 1934); and Hartford, CT: 16.1°F; old record 16.5° (Feb. 1934). Blue Hill Observatory COOP site near Boston measured 83.6” of snowfall in February. This qualifies as the snowiest month on record for any site in Massachusetts records. The previous state record for such was 78.0” at Monroe in Feb. 1893. Image credit: Tom Gearty/MIT.
 
Deadliest disaster of February 2015: Afghanistan blizzards and avalanches
The deadliest disaster of February 2015 was the series of blizzards and avalanches that hit Afghanistan
February 24 - 28, killing at least 286. Some of the slides wiped out entire villages in the provinces of Panjshir, Badakhshan, and Bamyan, and 1,250 homes were destroyed.


Figure 3. Afghan survivors of an avalanche search their destroyed houses in the Abdullah Khil village of the Dara district of Panjshir province, north of Kabul on March 1, 2015. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani February 28 pledged to set up a relief fund for the victims of avalanches that claimed over 286 lives, and called for international help with the relief effort. Image credit: SHAH MARAI/AFP/Getty Images.

El Niño arrives in February 2015
NOAA issued an El Niño advisory in February 2015, heralding the official arrival of weak El Niño conditions in the equatorial Eastern Pacific. Sea surface temperatures were 0.6°C above average in the so-called Niño3.4 region (5°S - 5°N, 120°W - 170°W), where SSTs must be at least 0.5°C above average for five consecutive months (each month being a 3-month average) for an El Niño event to be declared. One more such period (Jan – Mar) is needed for the current event to go into record books as an El Niño episode. NOAA is giving a 50 - 60% chance of El Niño lasting through summer, and subsurface water temperatures are well above average through most of the equatorial Pacific. I gave a detailed analysis of the possibility of El Niño intensifying later this year in Wednesday's blog post.
 
Arctic sea ice falls to 3rd lowest February extent on record
Arctic sea ice extent during February 2015 was the 3rd lowest in the 36-year satellite record, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC). However, during the first half of March, Arctic sea ice extent fell to its lowest level on record, and set a record for the lowest winter maximum, as discussed by Bob Henson in a March 9 blog post.
 
Notable global heat and cold marks set for February 2015
Hottest temperature in the Southern Hemisphere: 49.2°C (120.6°F) at Roebourne Airport  (Australia), February 21
Coldest temperature in the Southern Hemisphere: -61.5°C (-78.7°F) at Dome Fuji (Valkyrjedomen), Antarctica, February 27

Hottest temperature in the Northern Hemisphere: 43.0°C (109.4°F) at Navrogno, Ghana, February 12
Coldest temperature in the Northern Hemisphere: -60.9°C (-77.6°F) at Summit, Greenland, February 13

On February 21, Wittenoom, Australia recorded a minimum temperature of 35.1°C (95.2°F), which is a new world record of highest minimum temperature for the month of February.

Major stations that set new all-time heat or cold records in February 2015
Ottosdal (South Africa) max. 40.6°C, February 9
Llay Llay (Chile) max. 40.2°C, February 12
Lynchburg (Pennsylvania, USA) min. -23.9°C, February 20
Lamap Malekula (Vanuatu) max. 34.8 °C, February 24

New all-time national and territorial heat records set or tied in 2015
Ghana tied the national record of highest temperature with 43.0°C (109.4°F) at Navrongo on February 12.
Wallis and Futuna Territory (France) set a new territorial heat record with 35.5°C (95.9°F) on January 19 at Futuna Airport.
Samoa tied its national heat record with 36.5°C (97.7°F) on January 20 at Asau. Previously, the record was set at the same location in December 1977.

A big thanks goes to Maximiliano Herrera for providing the global heat and cold records. He maintains a comprehensive list of extreme temperature records for every nation in the world on his website.

The Climate Change Elevator Pitch
Climate change videographer Peter Sinclair, whom I've done a number of interviews with, interviewed scientists in San Francisco in December 2014 at the annual American Geophysical Union's annual meeting. Climate scientist John Cook, who asked the actual questions during the interviews, had the brilliant idea to ask each of them one last question:

“Ok, you’re getting on an elevator with someone, and they say, “So you’re a climate scientist--what’s all this about climate change and global warming? You’ve got 10 floors. Go.”

The Elevator Pitch series has been pretty well received. Al Gore’s Climate Reality group uploaded some of these to their facebook page where glaciologist Eric Rignot's piece got more than a quarter million views. Here are the Climate Change Elevator Pitches that have been released so far:

NASA glaciologist Eric Rignot
Penn State glacier expert Richard Alley
Texas Tech's Katherine Hayhoe
Ken Caldeira, Carnegie Institution for Science
Simon Donner, University of British Columbia

Another interesting collection of short videos by climate scientists has just been released by morethanscientists.org. Featured are hurricane scientist Kerry Emanuel, Texas Tech's Katherine Hayhoe, and more than 100 others. The videos offer a unique glimpse into the real life stories, personal views and feelings of the experts on climate change, emphasizing not the science itself, but why it matters--and what it will mean for our children and grandchildren. "I'm very excited about this new campaign. Too few people have seen the lighter and more personal side of climate scientists," said climate scientist Michael E. Mann, director of Penn State's Earth System Science Center and advisory board member of More Than Scientists. "Many of us are science nerds. But we are ordinary people too, and like anyone else, we care about our children and grandchildren, and the health of the world we leave behind for them. So I'm very excited about this new campaign and the promise it holds for communicating that message to the public."

Jeff Masters