NOAA: Earth had its 4th-warmest year on record in 2013

Doyle Rice, USA TODAY1:58 p.m. EST January 21, 2014

The Earth had its 4th-warmest year on record in 2013, scientists from NOAA announced Tuesday.

The Earth had its 4th-warmest year on record in 2013, equaling the level set in 2003, scientists from NOAA announced Tuesday.

The average temperature across global land and ocean surfaces was 1.12 degrees above the 20th-century average and marks the 37th consecutive year (since 1976) that the annual temperature was above the long-term average.

All of the top 10 warmest years on record have occurred since 1998.
Global temperature records go back to 1880.

This was one of the warmest years on record that did not include the warming influence of an El Nino climate pattern, according to Thomas Karl, director of NOAA's National Climatic Data Center.

NASA, using different methods of analyzing the data than NOAA, reported Tuesday that 2013 was tied as 7th-warmest year on record.

The worst global weather disaster in 2013 was Super Typhoon Haiyan, which killed more than 5,700 people as it lashed the Philippines in November.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/weathe...-2013/4719911/