Click for source image
No red dots on this map. The map above appears to be representing Weather Service Forecast Office forecast zones, though I’m not absolutely sure since no reference is included with the map. If so, then each of these divisions is an area where a Zone Forecast is issued for. These are what we see as our regular daily forecasts on TV, Newspapers, and Radio. The map above is from NCDC’s research section and was brought to my attention by WUWT commenter “pearlandaggie”.
Update: It turns out they are “climate divisions” see here with thanks to Basil.
The public hasn’t been widely exposed to the map above. The map below is what was in the latest press release.
If we just look at the month of December, the USA still looks cooler than normal or near normal for the most part, with the southeast USA being the exception:
Click for source image
NOAA says in the press release:
South Carolina and Georgia had their sixth and eighth, respectively, warmest December on record.
The first map was not part of the press release, the second one was. I wonder why NOAA chose not to include a yearly map presentation like the first one above from their research section, but only chose to show one for December 2008 even though the title of the press release was:
NOAA: 2008 Temperature for U.S. Near Average, was Coldest Since 1997; Below Average for December
It would seem to me that if you run a press release about the entire year of 2008, you’d put in a map for 2008 also. It’s not like they didn’t have one available.
To their credit, they did include the time series, but as my years of television experience have told me, that isn’t often as easily interpreted by the general public.
Here is what the CONUS temperature time series looks like with 2008 added, as included in the press release:
NOAA says in their press release:
For 2008, the average temperature of 53.0 degrees F was 0.2 degree above the 20th Century average.
In other words; near normal.
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And now another branch of the U.S. Government, the USGS, announces they led a synthesis of trash studies. The latest consensus is that the Arctic is melting. Apparently someone thinks this is a popularity contest rather than a study of reality.
http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=2109
http://climatescience.gov/
WilliMc (10:03:32) :
There are sort of two concepts here. Heat is both “sensible” (and that’s what a thermometer measures) and “latent” (due to water vapor which “contains” the heat needed to evaporate it. As air rises, it cools, and when water vapor turns to cloud it releases the latent heat, so the temperature declines slower than would happen if the air were dry.
As for Camp Irwin, the dry air evaporated any sweat quickly and that cooled your skin. (Sensible heat converted to latent heat.) At Riley, you sweat would largely drip off – you body worked to produce it and got little benefit.
My family bicycled across the hot, dry desert of eastern Oregon in July 2003. 106F wasn’t fun, even in the dry air. We generally soaked our jerseys in any stream that had water. Much less work than making sweat.
I was at Ft. Riley in the early 80s (1983/84) and we went to Ft Irwin (I assume you mean Fort and not Camp) in August 1983 for 30 days. It was hot, but, as the saying goes, it was a dry heat. Actually it wasn’t that dry. It rained more while we were there than it had for the previous 10 years combined. Lots of flash floods, and the mudskippers were happy.
The other thing about Ft Irwin and nearby areas (Barstow and Victorville, CA) is that the low humidity means that it can cool more quickly in the evenings. A triple-digit temperature (F) day may be followed by an evening in the 70s or 80s F. And when I say evening, I mean a few minutes after sundown.
Love the site, check it daily, but since I’m not at all versed in the field, I rarely comment.
Very true. While it was 110 in the daytime, at night it got close to freezing. Had to sleep in my mountain bag on the top of the APC.
It seems to me that the headline on the press release is ambiguous. The average 2008 temperatures may have ended up near the long-term norm, but that map is anything but normal.
Every other large region temperature map I have ever seen, for any time scale, has some red and some blue. An all-blue map is anything but normal.
Roger Carr (21:58:21) :
Greg (19:31:15) wrote: “In that case, I delare the optimum temperature to be 21degC by night and 35degC by day.”
An excellent example of why men go to war, Greg. Your optimums would kill me (we are having a taste of them in Melbourne). It may be my time of life, but 8-10C at night and 23C day is my dream; and Pamela Gray’s climate is feared…
I’m sorry, but this is just all wrong. I am quite certain that 35C +/- 2 day and night year round is ideal. What? Never been to Jamaica?
The tan portions of the map are above normal.
Thanks for the input. As I understand the humidity is not a factor in measuring by a thermometer.
By the way, it was Camp Irwin back in 1954.
REPLY: Humidity does not affect the thermometer itself, but humidity does affect the local atmosphere, and thus the temperature highs and lows measured by the thermometer. Witness the desert for example, where low humidity encourages deeper overnight low temperatures. – Anthony
Has anyone taken into account that most weather stations (here in Oz) anyway are sited at airports. Most airports I know have great swathes of concrete and bitumen which absorb a great deal of heat during the day and release it again at night.
BTW I have also noticed while standing out on that tarmac that any storms (esp summer) in the area seem to split up just near the airport, go around and rejoin on the other side. This is in Wagga Wagga, NSW where summer day temps of 40+ degrees C are not uncommon. I have had it explained to me as the upwelling of heat from the airport and has been noticed by colleagues in other places like Katherine, NT which has similar temps but is much more tropical.
I too am interested in what is considered a “normal” temperature for the planet when 40+ here in the southern hemisphere is offset somewhat by the -30+ experienced at similar northern latitudes. Who decided that 1990 or whatever is the “climate optimum” ?
I have tracked the local (mid North Carolina) temperature since October 1st. October, November and January were all colder than “normal” by 1 to 4 degrees F. December was warmer only because of a week long warm spell. So far the entire winter still averages about 1 degree F colder than normal.
I think the choice of the month of December instead of the yearly or quarterly data was another example of “picking the data to fit the wishes of the powers that be” Forty years as an industrial chemist has taught me the fastest way to get fired is to publish data that contradicts the wishes of the powers that be especially when it is the truth. Honesty got me fired five times over the years so I do not see any reason this fact of life has changed, especially when powerful men are going to use the data for political reasons.
All I know is that I read a piece where they tried to use actual historical data and go back in time to see if the computer models matched up to what actually happened and guess what…
The computer models failed miserably to predict the “future”. DUH!!!
To all the global warming alarmists out there: It’s the SUN, stupid!!!!