Giant blobs of warm water in the tropical and northeast Pacific Ocean helped boost 2015 to the top of the rankings, according to the NOAA climate report. Like a pot of boiling water on a stove, the warm seawater radiates heat into the atmosphere and raises the planet's average temperature. The global average temperature includes measurements over land and ocean surfaces.
Because these warm-water pools are predicted to persist through year-end, more heat records could fall in the coming months. In the tropical Pacific, the warm water is linked to an ongoing El Niño, the cyclic phenomenon that shifts global weather. NOAA forecasts a 60 percent chance that the El Niño will last through fall.
The only place on Earth with notably cooler-than-average temperatures in March was northeastern Canada. Despite the record-breaking snow and chilly temperatures along the Atlantic Coast earlier this year, no state set a new cold record in the first three months of 2015, according to NOAA.
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Apr 19 @ 6:06 PM ET
2015 could become the hottest year on record
Giant blobs of warm water in the tropical and northeast Pacific Ocean helped boost 2015 to the top of the rankings, according to the NOAA climate report. Like a pot of boiling water on a stove, the warm seawater radiates heat into the atmosphere and raises the planet's average temperature. The global average temperature includes measurements over land and ocean surfaces.
Because these warm-water pools are predicted to persist through year-end, more heat records could fall in the coming months. In the tropical Pacific, the warm water is linked to an ongoing El Niño, the cyclic phenomenon that shifts global weather. NOAA forecasts a 60 percent chance that the El Niño will last through fall.
The only place on Earth with notably cooler-than-average temperatures in March was northeastern Canada. Despite the record-breaking snow and chilly temperatures along the Atlantic Coast earlier this year, no state set a new cold record in the first three months of 2015, according to NOAA.
