National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
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The Climate Post: BP oil spill washes up on Potomac shores
First things first: Oil-spill updates continue to gush out of the Gulf and Washington at volumes difficult to estimate. BP initiated its risky “top kill” maneuver Wednesday and the Coast Guard reported cautiously this morning that the oil stream has abated. If the effort works, BP will begin to plug the well with concrete in […]
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Obama’s ocean chief dismisses loop current threat: ‘Very little tarballs!’
Cross-posted from the Wonk Room. Yesterday, Obama’s ocean chief said that the threat of the BP oil disaster getting caught in the Loop Current “sounds scarier than it is.” As she was making these statements, satellites imagery showed the Maryland-sized slick being entrained in the Loop Current, which loops through the Gulf of Mexico and […]
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NOAA: Models indicate El Niño will continue through Spring 2010
We seem to have settled into a moderate to strong El Niño. NOAA’s latest weekly update on the El Niño/Southern oscillation, “ENSO Cycle: Recent Evolution, Current Status and Predictions“ shows that the key region of the Pacific Ocean has stayed quite warm for all of November (see here for figures and data). The question is […]
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NOAA – Second hottest September on record
NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center has issued its latest monthly, “State of the Climate: Global Analysis,” which found: The combined global land and ocean surface temperature for September 2009 was 0.62°C (1.12°F) above the 20th Century average of 15.0°C (59.0°F). This was the second warmest September on record, behind 2005, and the 33rd consecutive September […]
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Ask Umbra on combating climate denial
Send your question to Umbra! Q. Dear Umbra, This “year with no summer” and some alleged statistics I have seen quoted about earth-wide temperatures for the last ten years have resulted in claims that the earth is not heating — it may even be cooling. What about it? Arthur WaskowShalom Center, Philadelphia A. Dearest Arthur, […]
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NOAA: El Niño expected to strengthen and last through the Northern Hemisphere winter
NOAA’s National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center released its monthly El Niño/Southern oscillation (ENSO) Diagnostic Discussion: A weak El Niño continued during August 2009, as sea surface temperature (SST) remained above-average across the equatorial Pacific Ocean (Fig. 1). Consistent with this warmth, the latest weekly values of the Niño-region SST indices were between +0.7°C […]
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NOAA: “El Niño is expected to strengthen and last through” winter
NOAA’s National Weather Service Climate Prediction Center released its monthly El Niño/Southern oscillation (ENSO) Diagnostic Discussion: Synopsis: El Niño is expected to strengthen and last through the Northern Hemisphere Winter 2009-2010. A weak El Niño was present during July 2009, as monthly sea surface temperatures (SST) departures ranged from +0.5°C to +1.5°C across the equatorial […]
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NCDC: Second hottest June on record — and El Nino “to threaten previous record highs”
Fast on the heels of the fourth warmest May on record, NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center reports: Based on preliminary data, the globally averaged combined land and sea surface temperature was the second warmest on record for June, and the January-June year-to-date tied with 2004 as the fifth warmest on record. NCDC notes that the […]
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Must-read NOAA paper smacks down the deniers
Nothing occupies global warming deniers more than trying to prove that the U.S. temperature record — a tiny portion of the global temperature record — is not reliable. Now NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center has issued an excellent Q&A, “Is the U.S. Temperature Record Reliable?” that should settle that question for any objective observer. The […]
