Second warmest April on record globally
NASA GISS has released their April 2017 global temperature anomaly data for land/ocean combined.
According to the report, last month was the second warmest April on record globally. The NASA GISS global surface temperature data set goes back to 1880.
April 2017 averaged 0.88 of a degree Celsius above the 1851-1980 mean, making it the second warmest on record behind April 2016, which averaged 1.06 degrees Celsius above the mean.
Image courtesy NASA GISS.
<img src="https://vortex.accuweather.com/adc2004/pub/includes/columns/miscellaneous/2017/590x380_05161857_amapsapr.png"/>
So far this year (Jan-Apr 2017) the average global temperature departure is +0.99 of a degree Celsius, which currently runs second warmest on record behind January-April 2016, which averaged +1.19 deg. Celsius.
Based on the above information and taking into account all of the other years, I feel fairly confident that 2017 will end up as the second warmest year on record behind 2016.
The NASA GISS image below shows the actual global land/ocean temperature graph (black line) since the late 1950s compared to the three different greenhouse gas emission temperature scenarios, which were made by Dr. Hansen. As you can see, we are running closest to the scenario B plot over the past three years.
<img src="https://vortex.accuweather.com/adc2004/pub/includes/columns/miscellaneous/2017/590x385_05161912_pnas_gtch_fig2.png"/>
Breaking it down by hemisphere, April 2017 was the third warmest April on record for both the Northern and Southern hemispheres. The warmest April on record for both hemispheres occurred in 2016.
The final NASA GISS map below shows the global land/ocean surface temperature anomalies for the northern hemisphere cold season/southern hemisphere warm season. Warm anomalies clearly dominate.
<img src="https://vortex.accuweather.com/adc2004/pub/includes/columns/miscellaneous/2017/590x380_05161914_amapsnhemcold.png"/>
