90% Certainty That 2012 Will End Up As Hottest Year On Record

[hatrack]

Continuing a hot trend, October was the fifth warmest across the globe since record keeping began in 1880. And climate scientists say it's likely, about 90 percent so, that 2012 will become the warmest year on record for the contiguous United States.

The last 36 Octobers, including this one, have experienced global temperatures above the 20th-century average; in fact, the past 332 months have all shown above-average temperatures globally, according to a report by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

"There were no parts of the globe that were record cold during October 2012," said climatologist Jake Crouch, of NOAA's National Climatic Data Center, during a press briefing today (Nov. 15). The last October with global temperatures dipping below the 20th-century average occurred in 1976, while the last month to do the same was February 1985, according to NOAA.

The record October temperature — 58.23 degrees F (14.63 degrees C) — refers to the combined average temperature across the planet's land and sea surfaces, reaching 1.13 degrees F (0.63 degrees C) above the 20th-century average; this also tied with the global temperature measure in October 2008. To date, this year stands as the eighth warmest on record for global average temperatures.

EDIT

http://news.yahoo.com/90-chance-2012-warmest-record-us-202808646.html

[joshcryer]

1. I know weather isn't climate change but Colorado has trended 10+.

Ten degrees above average. Not that I'm complaining, I work outdoors, but damn, every time Colorado seems warm, a global record seems to be broken (if ya'll recall I followed the temperature trends every week in 2010 and was correct).

I dunno. Could just be in my head, but Colorado is one hell of a bell weather in my experience.