While the coronavirus pandemic may have forced much of the world’s population to chill at home (literally across much of Canada), the weather outside was frightful, with the US Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reporting that May 2020 tied with 2016 as the world’s warmest May on record.
And the heat wasn’t just limited to May, according to scientists at the NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Centers for Environmental Information. The three-month season (March through May) and the year to date (January through May) ranked second-warmest in the 141-year global record.
Here’s a closer look into NOAA’s latest monthly global climate report:
MAY 2020
The average global temperature in May was 0.95°C (1.71°F) above the 20th-century average, tying with May 2016 as the hottest May on record. For the Northern Hemisphere, it was the hottest May recorded, with a temperature of 1.19 °C (2.14°F) above average.
• May 2020 marked the 44th consecutive May and the 425th consecutive month with temperatures, at least nominally, above the 20th-century average.
• Canada cool: Cooler-than-average temperatures were seen during May across much of Canada, the eastern contiguous US, eastern Europe and Australia, where temperatures ran at least 1.8°F (1.0°C) below average.
• The 10 warmest have all occurred since 1998. However, the 2014-2020 Mays are the seven warmest in the 141-year record.
• Arctic sea ice was low, again: The May average Arctic sea ice coverage was the fourth smallest in the 42-year record, 7.0% below the 1981–2010 average, according to analysis by the National Snow and Ice Data Center.
MARCH-MAY
The average global temperature for the season spanning March through May was 1.06°C (1.91°F) above average, making it the second hottest such period on record behind 2016. The Northern Hemisphere had its second-warmest spring, and the Southern Hemisphere had its third-warmest autumn on record.
YTD, JAN-MAY
The period from January through May (YTD) was also the second hottest on record after 2016, with a global temperature of 1.10°C (1.98°F) above the 20th-century average of 13.1°C (55.5°F).
South America, Europe, Asia and the Gulf of Mexico region had their warmest YTD on record.
Meanwhile, according to a statistical done by NCEI scientists, the year 2020 is very likely (>99.9%) to rank among the five warmest years on record.
