The top 10 weather and climate events of a record-setting year
Calendar year 2020 was an extreme and abnormal year, in so many ways. The global coronavirus pandemic altered people’s lives around the world, as did extreme weather and climate events. Let’s review the year’s top 10 such events.
1. Hottest year on record?
The official rankings will not be released until January 14, but according to NASA, Earth’s average surface temperature in 2020 is likely to tie with 2016 for the hottest year on record, making the last seven years the seven hottest on record.
Remarkably, the record warmth of 2020 occurred during a minimum in the solar cycle and in a year in which a moderate La Niña event formed. Surface cooling of the tropical Pacific during La Niña events typically causes a slight global cool-down, as does the minimum of the solar cycle, making it difficult to set all-time heat records. The record heat of 2020 in these circumstances is a demonstration of how powerful hu
By Jeff Masters, PhD, and Dana Nuccitelli | Dec 21, 2020
In an all-around bizarre and largely unpleasant calendar year, extreme weather and climate-related changes contributed to the woes of 2020.
By Jeff Masters, PhD, and Dana Nuccitelli | Monday, December 21, 2020
It doesn’t get any more ‘2020’ than this: on September 16, 2020, smoke from record western U.S. wildfires pours into the circulation of Hurricane Paulette, one of a record 30 Atlantic named storms in 2020. (Image credit: CIRA/RAM)
Calendar year 2020 was an extreme and abnormal year, in so many ways. The global coronavirus pandemic altered people’s lives around the world, as did extreme weather and climate events. Let’s review the year’s top 10 such events.