2021 was 6th warmest year on record, NASA and NOAA find. Canada definitely felt the heat
CBC
The numbers are in: Earth is still running a fever.
NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) released their annual assessment of global temperatures and found that 2021 was the sixth warmest year on record.
NOAA recorded global land and sea surface temperatures that were 0.84 C above the 20th century average, while NASA recorded 0.85 C.
"It's certainly warmer now than at any time in at least the past 2,000 years and probably much longer," said Russell S. Vose, the climate analysis chief of NOAA's National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI), in a teleconference.
While the ranking isn't the most important gauge of climate change — Vose pointed to others, such as ice-sheet melt, changes in animal behaviour and migration patterns — it's a good indicator of Earth's warming trajectory.
"This is just one indicator of a world that's warming," said Vose. "The last seven or eight years have been the warmest on record. It's pretty clear that it's getting warmer."
NCEI climatologist Ahira Sanchez-Lugo compared the data to being like a person's annual checkup.
"We're constantly taking Earth's vital signs. And not only do we archive it, but we analyze it to help us understand how healthy the Earth is," she said.
"When you go to your annual health checkup, the doctor is collecting data from you — they weigh you, they take your blood pressure, they take a blood sample. And not only do they archive that information, but the doctor looks at it year-to-year to see if there are any changes and know how healthy you are.
"So all of [this] is telling us that the Earth's climate is changing."
The two U.S. science agencies said that some of the notable climate events of 2021 were: the heat wave that crushed the Pacific Northwest; another heat wave that impacted Europe and the first rainfall on the Greenland ice cap.
While 2021 placed in the Top 10 of hottest on record, the fact that it didn't rank higher wasn't a surprise to climatologists. That's because it was a year with La Niña, a cooling of the Pacific Ocean that has a cooling effect across parts of the planet.
"Once we started with La Niña, we already knew that it wasn't going to be a record-warm year," said Sanchez-Lugo. "But we knew that it would be a Top 10 year because of how warm we've been so far."
On Monday, the European Union's Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) had released its annual findings, placing 2021 as the fifth warmest, at 1.1-1.2 C above 1850-1900 levels. The agency also noted that the past seven years were the planet's warmest "by a clear margin," with records dating back to 1850.
P.E.I.'s Public Schools Branch is looking for 50 substitute bus drivers, and it'll be recruiting at three job fairs on Saturday, June 8. The job fairs are located at the Atlantic Superstore in Montague, Royalty Crossing in Charlottetown, and the bus parking lot of Three Oaks Senior High in Summerside. All three run from 9 a.m. until noon. Dave Gillis, the director of transportation and risk management for the Public Schools Branch, said the number of substitute drivers they're hiring isn't unusual. "We are always looking for more. Our drivers tend to have an older demographic," he said.