Global warming and Philadelphia
Epochally warm here in January and February, but cool elsewhere.
Climatologists, even those who have been telling us that the world is getting warmer and that humans are contributing, caution that no single anomalous event should be given too much significance.
Given what has happened here this winter, compared with what's occurred elsewhere in the world, that is more than reasonable caution.
As we've reported, Philadelphia just completed its fourth-warmest December-through-February period in 138 years go records.
Officially, it tied for the fourth least-snowiest, at 4 inches, and some places reported even less.
Generally, Philadelphia's overall temperatures have risen in concert with world temperatures in recent decades. However, that relationship has been by no means strictly linear.
While it was quite warm here in January, worldwide it was the coolest January since 2008, according to the National Climate Data Center.
And the NASA satellite data released this morning have February was about 0.2 degrees Fahrenheit below the 30-year average.
Two tidbits from the report by researchers John Christy and Roy Spencer underscore the dramatic temperature contrasts in February.
Temperatures over Tajikistan, in central Asia, were 8.5 degrees below normal in February. Due north of that country, near the Arctic Ocean shore, they were 11 degrees above.