NOAA monthly weather summaries normally describe the month in terms of their warmness ranking. April is looking like an interesting month, with remarkably consistent cold across the entire US. Much of the center of the country has been 2 to 6 degrees below normal. In parts of the Dakotas, 10 or more degrees below normal.
Perhaps the rest of the month will be much warmer? Not likely, NCEP forecasts continued cold through at least the 20th.
Will this month of severe global warming be described as the “100th warmest?”
When talking to someone in person we can tell from the tone of their voice, or the expression on their face if they are being sarcastic or serious. But on internet blogs we have no such clues. I think that what smiley faces are for. 🙂
Bull’s eye on the wheat belt. Of course, recovery is possible. However, if this persists through May, there will be trouble.
Graphic seems Ok for Central MN. April started out below normal but, thankfully, has moderated.
Anecdotally, it has seemed hazy on the coldest, windless, clearest days all winter. I wonder if clouds and snow really are the whole albedo story.
Anyway, the blue skies seem more pale and pastel than my memories.
When we see something like this which focuses on NA or the US, there’s always the observation or two (or more) about what is happening elsewhere in the world. The Japanese have a great world map updated weekly for those who cannot get enough of this kind of stuff (i.e. wait until the UAH/HadCRUT type monthly data are available). To begin, go here:
http://ds.data.jma.go.jp/tcc/tcc/products/climate/synop.html
It will come up defaulting to raw temperatures. Use the pull down menu to switch to anomalies. The latest week is through April 7. It shows how cool it has been in the US west of the Appalachians. It has also been cooler than usual in SE Asia, NE Africa, and a few other places around the globe. At mid latitudes in the NH, ~45 deg N, it has been warmer than normal across Europe and Central Asia.
BTW, “normal” here is, I believe, relative to 1971-2000.
I much prefer this source to the GISS spatial plots of global temperature because I don’t like (or trust) the smoothing GISS does.
On temperature anomaly colors. I think that anything + or – 2C should be colored white. That would really save money on ink cartridges, and people could calm down a little.
I think that map is right on the money according to the forecast here, anywhere from upper 50’s to low 70’s, we’re actually started to get more spring-like temperatures this month after starting below normal, and the good news is we can watch the trees leaf out and the plants pop up because it looks like Winter has called it quits here till next year.
Juraj v.
A note to Juraj v. and others in continental Europe.
The Northern Polar Jet Stream has been generally unstable over your part of the planet for most of the winter. It continues into the Spring with large loops and cut-off low pressure circulations. The instability pulls surface air of various temperatures around adding to the variability of the surface weather. The website for the Java loop is here.
https://www.fnmoc.navy.mil/efs/cgi-bin/efs_loop.cgi?strt=0&incr=24&stop=240&imagePrefix=US058VMET-GIFwxg.EFS.nh_sc_5640_&title=EFS%20500%20HPa%20Single%20Contour%20Probability
The website is an unclassified US Navy site and will record your IP adress, but it is I think, harmless.
Enjoy
No they will just set the base period to the last glaciation and call it in the top 5% of warm years.
Steven,
“Flanagan et. al
Hate to rain on your warming parade again. This is what Dr. John Christy at UAH told me about the graphs you are looking at-
Our daily products are at:
http://www.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/t2lt/tltday_5.2
The chart (you are looking at) is of absolute temperatures that have not had the proper base period calibration.”
Fair point – the released calibrated UAH global temperature data show the first three months of 2009 were 0.27 degC warmer than 2008, while the daily figures make it 0.22 degC warmer.
You’re weather, though, may vary.
@Ron de Haan (08:21:59) :
Energy prices are dropping, so Obama must be furious. World spot prices for LNG dropped from their record-highs in 2008 at $25 per million Btu, to recent prices of around $4 per million.
Historic natural gas futures prices on the NYMEX are shown here, with the recent trend dropping like a rock:
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/ng/hist/rngc1d.htm
also, see:
http://energyguysmusings.blogspot.com/2009/04/lng-cheaper-than-ever.html
“will-april-be-the-100th-warmest-on-record”
If your record only goes back 100 years, absolutely. Maybe more.
Properly (ab)used, statistics can prove anything.
p.s.: Since there is no “normal” for Colorado, they can use any color they want for this state. We had a blizzard on Easter. Then it warmed up. If I pack the sno-blower away, it will snow again. Or do something else.
Tom P,
The UAH April anomaly will likely be down from March, and about half a degree lower than April, 1998.
Flanagan
At this point any “anomaly” number that shows continued “warming” is simply prooving that the method for calculating the anomaly is junk. Contact the various power companies for their heating degree days. We need to average about 30 C every day for the rest of the year just to get up to average for the year. Think that’s going to happen? The anomaly numbers are starting to look almost as accurate as the GISS data fudging.
Of course, April still has two weeks to go, and the weather can and will change in that time. In fact Joe Bastardi over at Accuweather (no warmingista, he) believes the NA mid-western cold anomalies will be will be wiped out by the end of the month, as the NA weather pattern shifts to warmer.
I’m a little startled by that orange splotch located directly on top of my home in Central New York. I don’t know where it comes from. I certainly haven’t noticed any warmer-than-normal weather lately. This is a cold little spot — Zone 4 for any gardeners out there — and snow lingering almost into May is quite normal for us. However, it has been even less warm than normal every day this month. My daffodils are barely beginning to bloom, a week or two later than normal, and we’re still wearing our woolies and pushing up the heat. The temp at my house yesterday morning at sunrise was 17 degrees.
Bill Illis
What I’d like to know is what does the graph look like if we use the raw data without the questionable adjustments made to emphasize the “warming”?
“Energy prices are dropping, so Obama must be furious. World spot prices for LNG dropped from their record-highs in 2008 at $25 per million Btu, to recent prices of around $4 per million.”
This is a crisis. And as we all know, this crisis must not be wasted. What a perfect time for this administration to enact legislation. The way I see it, we are already used to paying alot of money to those thieving oil companies, so why not pay ourselves with a $50/BTU consumer adjustment to pay for all those alternative energy jobs?
We’re gonna ALL BE RICH!!!!
“Heavy” snow is forecasted for the Colorado Rocky Mountains starting Wednesday night and ending by Sunday, according to the Colorado Avalanche Information Center (CAIC). The Colorado snowpack is at or slightly above average statewide. We’ve had copious snow and cold temperatures again this season – that’s four winters in a row with average to above average snow. According to AGW alarmists, ski seasons were scheduled to be shorter, snow-packs shallower, snow-levels higher, and temperatures warmer by now. If resorts didn’t close because of wildlife migrations, many resorts in Colorado could remain open until June/July, as A-Basin does. Last Spring I skied waist-deep powder in mid-May. In some areas above 13,000′ we have permanent snow-fields and cornices throughout the summer. Could they be the beginnings of new glaciers? The Washington Cascades, at much lower elevations, also have an above average snow-pack. The Alps also had massive snow accumulations this Winter. I see a trend, a cooling trend.
Roger Sowell (10:13:50) :
@Ron de Haan (08:21:59) :
“Energy prices are dropping, so Obama must be furious. World spot prices for LNG dropped from their record-highs in 2008 at $25 per million Btu, to recent prices of around $4 per million.
Historic natural gas futures prices on the NYMEX are shown here, with the recent trend dropping like a rock:
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/ng/hist/rngc1d.htm
also, see:
http://energyguysmusings.blogspot.com/2009/04/lng-cheaper-than-ever.html“”
Yes Robert.
That is one of the reasons why Obama is so eager to push for climate legislation.
Adolfo Giurfa (08:08:42) :
“I would say the last years has been the most shameful years for NOAA”
And NASA
“”””””The last ten years have been the warmest in the history of the planet, “””””
In the history of the PLANET? OF THE PLANET?
Yes, I’m shouting, because that is so absurd on the face of it. I imagine that quite a few dinosaurs and therapsids from previous earthly epochs would have a thing or two to say about that. Ah, yes, they’re dead — how convenient for you. Perhaps the most disgraceful aspect of the AGW hysteria is the inability of such people (you included, Mr. Goddard) to think beyond a few decades when discussing a 4.5 billion-year-old planet. Simply incredible that folks with views like yours call us skeptics “like holocaust deniers,” when your side of the debate are worse than hard-core creationists in your simple-minded understanding of the complexities of climate and other natural phenomena.
As to citing the need to be “credentialed” like that crackpot Hansen, what disnigenuous crap.
there has to be some errors in this graph!
http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/seaice/extent/AMSRE_Sea_Ice_Extent.png
there’s no ice left in the arctic, it all melted last summer.
ICE free!
RE –
Forecast for Denver:
Snow occurring on Apr 17 | Apr 18. Total amount 7 Inches.
http://www.accuweather.com/us/co/denver/80201/forecast.asp?partner=forecastfox&traveler=1&zipchg=1&metric=0
Wolf Creek announced they’re re-opening again this weekend because of the forecast heavy snows coming for the Southwest mountains. Steamboat just closed though it is expected to snow all week (Steamboat is one of the lowest altitude resorts in CO, though it is also the most northern).
They all stop adding to their snow totals after closing, however, so Steamboat’s numbers are stuck at 405″ (only the 7th time over 400″ ever) in spite of probably another foot or two on the way this week.
Mark
Ummmm, isn’t that big blue blot (cold temps) right over the grain belt of the US?? Anyone care to venture a guess what that means for the fall harvest? Can’t be good.