Can't happen here.
By Kurtis Alexander
November 20, 2014
The Earth is on track for its warmest year on record, federal scientists said Thursday after temperatures in October climbed to historical highs.
Despite relatively cool weather across much of the United States this year, including big snowstorms along the East Coast in recent days, four of the past five months worldwide have seen record-breaking average temperatures, according to theNational Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Record heat has flogged large chunks of Europe, Russia and the Pacific Ocean, scientists said.
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California, too, has seen many warm months this year. The state averaged a temperature of 63.8 degrees between January and October — 1.6 degrees above the previous high set for the same period in both 2003 and 1992, according to NOAA.
California is “virtually certain” to have its warmest year on record, said Thursday’s NOAA report.
The global heat is propelled by warming ocean waters and is in sync with what climate experts say are rising surface temperatures due to an increase in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
While one month or even one year isn’t indicative of a trend, scientists say the burning of fossil fuels over time is trapping heat and changing the climate.
The average global temperature of 58.43 degrees this October was 1.3 degrees above the 20th century average for the month, and 0.02 degrees above the previous October high in 2003.
Kurtis Alexander is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: kalexander@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @kurtisalexander
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