May 2015 is by far the warmest May based on the official records of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The first five months of 2015 are also regarded as the warmest months period in the world in terms of land and ocean surfaces. The temperatures noted by the agency for January to May 2015 are the highest ever among all the data recorded in the past 130 years.
May and March 2015 tied for first place for the warmest month, followed by January and February, and April ranks last on the list. Specifically, the joint temperature of land and ocean surfaces in May 2015 was 1.57 degrees Fahrenheit higher than the average recorded temperature in the whole of the 20th century. The temperature in May 2015 is 0.14 higher compared with that of May 2014.
The report released by the NOAA reveals that there are three major records broken recently. The first one is May 2015 exceeding the 20th century average mark, the second is the combination of the March-May 2015 surpassing the highest recorded data for these months by 32.07 degrees Fahrenheit, and the last is the first five months of 2015 beating 2010's record by 32.16 degrees Fahrenheit.
With the pattern of land and ocean temperature so far this year, 2015 is turning to be a hot year. Given that El Niño is fast becoming apparent, the chances by which temperatures can go down is rather slim.
During the El Niño period in 1987, a warm summer was followed by a warm autumn and an initially warm winter as well. While this may not necessarily happen in 2015, the trend of temperature patterns so far this year could equalize that of 2014's, when the January-May temperatures persisted throughout the year. As per estimates, if June-December 2015 matches the fifth-warmest month on record, 2015 can officially be declared as the warmest year ever.
"The oceans have been what's really been driving the warmth that we've seen in the last year-and-a-half to two years. We've seen really large warmth in all of the major ocean basins," said Deke Arndt, Climate Monitoring Branch chief at the National Centers for Environmental Education. "So, if there's anything unusual or weird, I guess, about what we're seeing, it's the fact that the entire global ocean is participating in this really extreme warmth that we've seen in the last couple years."
Photo: Global Panorama | Flickr
