Is climate change to blame for the record warmth this Christmas?

Boston Globe Media Partners, LLC ^ | December 21, 2015 | David Epstein

[daniel1212]

This week, with 60-degree or warmer weather for Christmas Eve lasting into Christmas Day, you may feel a little guilty if you’re enjoying it.

You may also be asking yourself if this unseasonal warmth is climate change in action.

When the weather gets weird, we often have strong reactions to what’s happening out there. It may seem logical that if, somehow, humans hadn’t spewed trillions of metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere over the past century, we'd have a cold, snowy December as has often been the case in the past. Right?

Wrong. This Isn't Climate Change. There have been many snowless Decembers before. Climate change isn’t responsible for this warm December. This year, it's connected to a strong El Nino and the polar vortex, which is whirling around the top of the planet so fast that the cold air can’t get out and escape south.

El Nino, which is warmer than average in the equatorial area off Peru, is adding a lot of heat to the atmosphere. It’s peaking right now, and it’s also going to spike the global temperature this year. 2015 will be warmer than any year on record, by quite a bit.

Here's more accurate way to think about how anthropogenic climate change is playing a role in our weather: Without humans, perhaps the temperatures forecast this week would be slightly cooler. Perhaps.

Over the coming decades, climate models predict fall-like weather extending later and spring-like weather arriving earlier. But there’s a lot more research needed into individual weather events and climate change...

Nearly three-quarters of the US population will experience temperatures over 60 degrees on Thursday. Records will fall from Florida to Maine

[digger48]

I remember riding my Harley on Christmas Day in the early 80’s. 60 degrees in northern IN that day.

[rktman]

Big NO, but it did cause some erf quake activity last night in Reno. 4.4 according to the news in the south part of town but Mrs. rktman felt it 20 miles north. Me? I wasn’t here when it happened. Out playing some music. Never felt a thing. Maybe we need to back off on the bass down from 11. :>)

[A Formerly Proud Canadian]

Granted, this has been a late onset winter in Calgary, but the Christmas high is only -15°C (5°F) and the low tonight is -20°C (-4°F). That AIN’T warm, baby! Of course, there is often a cold snap around Christmas/New Year’s Day.

[daniel1212]

El Niño

، 、‒ – — ― ‘ ’ “ ” I suspect some outsiders may think we speak in code here. If this was more common then someone might up with a Firefox extension that would correct it. There actually is one that will Replace typewriter quotes, apostrophes, ellipses and dashes with their typographically correct counterparts as you type, but not one to auto reformat all the latter. Posting into notepad and then here does not fix the problem.

[cyclotic]

I hope the moron Senator Markey doesn’t read this. He’ll start foaming at the mouth again.

[NormsRevenge]

Follow the jetstream.

Climate change haPPens..

[daniel1212]

Asked a friend of ours who was a native born Yankee if he had ever seen a winter like it before. His answer..."Only once." "When was that?" I asked. "This year!" he replied.

A tourist asked an old Mainer, "Lived here all your life?" "Not yet>"

[katana]

Cold weather kills and hot weather makes pretty women remove most of their clothing. And the Democrats can’t figure out why we don’t consider Global Warming a major problem?

[sport]

LOL

[MadMax, the Grinning Reaper]

On Christmas Day, 1978, I took my 3 year old son hiking at the Frederickburg’s battlefield park, in our short-sleeve shirts.

We didn’t know about “global warming” back then. In Jan. 1987, we had two back-to-back 18 inch snowstorms. Not a peep from anyone about global warming.

Weather is weather and there isn’t a damned thing you can do about it. Singing, “Only In Your Dreams”.

[georgiegirl]

We’re anticipating with great joy a white Christmas tomorrow in California. So, no, we are not experiencing the warmest winter, etc.

[moovova]

We’re in Washington state right now and it has rained 23 days straight. Not sure if this is normal, global warming/climate change, or Gaia’s Revenge...but it’s, at the very least, interesting.

[Ouderkirk]

I live in Rochester NY where the last two winters have been BRUTAL.

I live in Fairport, and yes the weather has been pretty tough in the last two winters. But like you, I remember 1997-98 and 1998-99 where what we used to call "open" where we didn't get much snow. It happens every once it a while. Usually after a couple of tough ones, which IIRC 1995-96 and 1996-97 were.

[FlingWingFlyer]

That’s awesome. I’ve been in Phoenix for a week and it’s been great. Even got cold at times.

[HotHunt]

It's 85 degrees in north central Florida today and forecast to be in the mid-80s everyday until New Years Eve when it will plunge to a frigid 74 degrees.

Might have to break out the goulashes and sled soon....

[wbill]

It all depends on what the media see when they step outside and see what the weather is like.

Well, that only applies to LIBERAL media. For them, weather is only important when it supports their religion.

When FReepers are still staring at ice floating on the Great Lakes in June, or get buried in snow in early October, those are "isolated events, suspiciously reported by right-wing kook climate deniers". :-)

I, for one, like it a little warm in December. Makes paying the heating bill easier.

[wbill]

Hah! The Blizzard of '78 was one of the more memorable ones that I had as a kid. There was too much snow to plow (that only happened a short handful of times, over the 20 years I lived in Maine) and we had to get a neighbor to come by and dig us out with a front-end bucket loader.

Feet and feet of white misery. I don't miss it. :-)

Glad that you had it good for Christmas, though!

[MadMax, the Grinning Reaper]

I got a ticket for parking (in our cul-de-sac) in front of my house during these blizzards. Only found one after the cops had towed my card (illegally) and the snow had melted. Our cul de sac was not in the emergency snow no-parking zone but the cops didn’t care.

Told the Impoundment lot to go screw themselves and that they could keep the car. The transmission was shot and I had blown the muffler into the asphalt.

They dropped towing charges and I signed the car over to them (my neighbor, who was going to buy it for the 386 Chevy engine, decided it was too powerful for his teenaged son).

Yes, that was one set of storms and county stupidity.

[Bob434]

[[Polar bears?

Screw em.]]

They’ve moved on from polar bears to walrus’ now- the poor walrus’ can’t find enough ice to calve on (contrary to actual evidence that show how their numbers increased-

http://polarbearscience.com/2014/10/04/high-walrus-numbers-may-explain-why-females-and-calves-are-hauling-out-in-droves/ )

[arthurus]

In 1989 down here we had freezing temperatures in the week before Christmas and snow that left three inches on the ground for three days, the third day of which was Christmas. After Christmas the temperature did not go below 50 for the rest of the winter. We had not had snow before that for 30 years and have not had it again.