Temperatures across the United States this winter have been on a roller coaster.
Average December temperatures in Minnesota, for example, were 14 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than usual, but the following month, they plummeted below the 30-year average before swinging back up to break an all-time high on January 31, hitting a balmy 55 degrees—nine degrees above the previous daily record. Parts of Montana saw a 90 to 100-degree temperature swing in the span of a month.
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Two Woods Hole scientists have been appointed to state and federal climate advisories. These advisories will begin meeting in February to provide science-based guidance to government decision-makers.
In December, Falmouth resident and Arctic ecologist Susan M. Natali was appointed to the new federal Advisory Council for Climate Adaptation Science by Secretary of the Interior Debra A. Haaland. Dr. Natali works at the Woodwell Climate Research Center, where she leads a project called Permafrost Pathways that addresses the impacts of permafrost thaw in the Arctic.
Sarah B. Das is a glaciologist and climate scientist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, where she has worked for over 20 years. She studies polar ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica, which have been rapidly melting over the last several years. In January, Dr. Das was appointed to the Massachusetts Office of Climate Science’s new Climate Science Advisory Panel.
Bitter cold continues to grip the United States as unusual freezing temperatures stretch as far south as Florida this week. Even more chilly weather is in store through the weekend, putting more than 80 percent of the US population under some type of cold weather advisory.
But this jarring cold snap is sandwiched between the end of what was the hottest year on record and the start of another year that could be even hotter. And even as temperatures plunge to new depths, the recent weather isn’t remotely enough to derail an ominous trend.
As the climate changes, the bottom of the temperature scale is rising faster than the top. This pronounced winter warming is often less palpable than the triple-digit summer heat waves that have become all the more frequent across much of the country, but no less profound.
Climatologists say the prevalence of strong southerly storms that have battered the Vineyard’s south shore this winter are due, in part, to the first El Niño winter in five years. Strengthened by rising and warming waters, Islanders should also expect more of these kinds of storms this season and into the future, according to experts.
Though the Vineyard and the rest of New England typically sees northeasters in the colder months, three storms have come up from the south and pass to the Island’s west, causing severe erosion at several of the Vineyard’s prized beaches.
Read more on The Vineyard Gazette.
The latest calculations from several science agencies showing Earth obliterated global heat records last year may seem scary. But scientists worry that what’s behind those numbers could be even worse.
The Associated Press asked more than three dozen scientists in interviews and emails what the smashed records mean. Most said they fear acceleration of climate change that is already right at the edge of the 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit) increase since pre-industrial times that nations had hoped to stay within.
“The heat over the last calendar year was a dramatic message from Mother Nature,” said University of Arizona climate scientist Katharine Jacobs. Scientists say warming air and water is making deadly and costly heat waves, floods, droughts, storms and wildfires more intense and more likely.
The 2023 El Nino year has taken global temperatures close to the 1.5°Celsius mark above pre-industrial levels and was the hottest year since records began. In response, the Global Collaboration Village (GCV), a World Economic Forum initiative, in partnership with Accenture and Microsoft, is convening leaders at the 2024 Annual Meeting to explore the global consequences.
The Village uses extended reality technology and immersion to bring the stark realities of the climate crisis to the forefront of global consciousness and explore appropriate response pathways.
Continue reading on the World Economic Forum’s website.
Over the last two years, Emma Street has taken trips to Canada’s North to places such as Tuktoyaktuk, a hamlet of less than a thousand people in the Northwest Territories, and Ulukhaktok, a small community on the west coast of Victoria Island. In these remote towns, Street, a Ph.D. student at the University of Victoria, has been meeting with Indigenous community members to learn about the Arctic’s changing landscape and how it is affecting their way of life.
“This is people’s lives and livelihoods and cultural connection,” said Street.
In March, she interviewed Irma and Ernie Francis, a Gwich’in couple who live in Inuvik, a town located about 120 miles north of the Arctic circle. Along the Mackenzie River, they saw houses sinking, the ground eroding beneath them. Community members shared how they’ve had to relocate due to the damage caused to their houses.
The Earth notched up its warmest year on record last year — but even that new peak is in danger of being surpassed in 2024.
The European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service confirmed a milestone Tuesday that scientists had long predicted: 2023’s average global temperature surpassed the previous peak set in 2016, and reached the highest mark since record-keeping began in 1880.