Last year tied for the fourth-hottest year on record around the globe. The average world temperature was 14.52?C, tying with 2003 for the fourth-warmest since 1880, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said on Tuesday.
At the same time, NASA, which calculates records in a different manner, ranked last year as the seventh-warmest on record, with an average temperature of 14.6?C. The difference is related to how the two agencies calculate temperatures in the Arctic and other remote places and is based on differences that are in the hundredths of a degree, scientists said.
Both agencies said nine of the 10th warmest years on record have happened in the 21st century. The hottest year was 2010, according to the NOAA.
“There are times such as today, when we can have snow even in a globally warmed world,” said Gavin Schmidt, deputy director of NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space Studies in New York. “But the long term trends are not going to disappear... Quite frankly, people have a very short memory when it comes to climate and weather.”
Those longer trends show the world has seen “fairly dramatic warming” since the 1960s with “a smaller rate of warming over the last decade or so,” said Thomas Karl, director of the NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center.
In the past 50 years, the world annual temperature has increased by nearly 0.8?C, according to NOAA data.
Unlike 2012, much of the worst heat and biggest climate disasters last year were outside the US. Parts of central Asia, central Africa and Australia were record warm. Only a few places, including the central US, were cooler than normal last year.
Temperatures that were only the 37th warmest for the nation last year. That followed the warmest year on record for the US.
Last year, the world had 41 US$1 billion-plus weather disasters, the second-highest number behind only 2010, according to insurance firm Aon Benfield, which tracks global disasters. Since 2000, the world has averaged 28 such US$1 billion-plus disasters, which are adjusted for inflation.
Nearly half of last year’s biggest weather disasters were in Asia and the Pacific region, including Typhoon Haiyan, which killed at least 6,100 people and caused US$13 billion in damage to the Philippines and Vietnam.
Other costly weather disasters included US$22 billion from central European flooding in June, US$10 billion in damage from Typhoon Fitow in China and Japan.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of
A prominent Christian leader has allegedly been stabbed at the altar during a Mass yesterday in southwest Sydney. Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel was saying Mass at Christ The Good Shepherd Church in Wakeley just after 7pm when a man approached him at the altar and allegedly stabbed toward his head multiple times. A live stream of the Mass shows the congregation swarm forward toward Emmanuel before it was cut off. The church leader gained prominence during the COVID-19 pandemic, amassing a large online following, Officers attached to Fairfield City police area command attended a location on Welcome Street, Wakeley following reports a number