TheClimateChanger

1931 is under 8 (4.1”), but this set is quite top heavy with the first two years averaging 22.8 inches. If the next two winters average less than that amount, the new running 10 year mean is guaranteed to be lower - even if both years are higher than the current 10 year running mean.

Records today at Zanesville (76), Wheeling (77) & DuBois (70).

Very impressive warmth. Unfortunately, having some problems embedding this Tweet / X-post. https://twitter.com/NWSPittsburgh/status/1899548043000623341

https://twitter.com/nwspittsburgh/status/1899548043000623341?s=46 NWS Pittsburgh @NWSPittsburgh A daily record high temperature was broken at Wheeling,WV: 74°F. The old record was 72°F, set in 1927. 3:48 PM · Mar 11, 2025 · 2,074 Views

Here are some of those bigger months at the old City Office. Climatological Data for World Trade Center, NY - March 1896 Date Max Temp (°F) Min Temp (°F) Avg Temp (°F) HDD CDD Precipitation (in) Snowfall (in) Snow Depth (in) 1896-03-01 46 34 40.0 25 0 0.13 0.0 0 1896-03-02 34 21 27.5 37 0 0.92 9.0 9 1896-03-03 29 19 24.0 41 0 0.00 0.0 7 1896-03-04 28 17 22.5 42 0 0.00 0.0 4 1896-03-05 39 14 26.5 38 0 0.00 0.0 2 1896-03-06 46 24 35.0 30 0 0.00 0.0 1 1896-03-07 51 33 42.0 23 0 0.12 0.0 T 1896-03-08 37 28 32.5 32 0 T T 0 1896-03-09 37 26 31.5 33 0 0.00 0.0 0 1896-03-10 33 26 29.5 35 0 0.01 0.1 T 1896-03-11 34 24 29.0 36 0 0.56 5.0 5 1896-03-12 28 19 23.5 41 0 0.07 0.0 4 1896-03-13 28 13 20.5 44 0 0.00 0.0 4 1896-03-14 30 14 22.0 43 0 0.00 0.0 4 1896-03-15 30 21 25.5 39 0 0.20 2.2 6 1896-03-16 34 26 30.0 35 0 1.90 8.3 14 1896-03-17 37 27 32.0 33 0 0.26 0.0 12 1896-03-18 40 26 33.0 32 0 0.00 0.0 11 1896-03-19 53 33 43.0 22 0 0.54 0.0 3 1896-03-20 41 22 31.5 33 0 T 0.0 2 1896-03-21 39 20 29.5 35 0 0.00 0.0 1 1896-03-22 47 33 40.0 25 0 0.04 0.0 T 1896-03-23 33 19 26.0 39 0 0.25 2.3 2 1896-03-24 29 13 21.0 44 0 0.16 1.6 3 1896-03-25 40 21 30.5 34 0 0.00 0.0 1 1896-03-26 53 30 41.5 23 0 0.04 0.0 T 1896-03-27 32 22 27.0 38 0 0.02 0.0 0 1896-03-28 42 27 34.5 30 0 0.00 0.0 0 1896-03-29 53 35 44.0 21 0 0.87 0.0 0 1896-03-30 58 35 46.5 18 0 0.04 0.0 0 1896-03-31 62 44 53.0 12 0 0.00 0.0 0 Sum 1223 766 - 1013 0 6.13 28.5 - Average 39.5 24.7 32.1 - - - - 3.1 Normal M M M M M M M - Climatological Data for World Trade Center, NY - February 1894 Date Max Temp (°F) Min Temp (°F) Avg Temp (°F) HDD CDD Precipitation (in) Snowfall (in) Snow Depth (in) 1894-02-01 34 27 30.5 34 0 0.06 0.6 1 1894-02-02 33 21 27.0 38 0 0.00 0.0 1 1894-02-03 44 30 37.0 28 0 0.00 0.0 1 1894-02-04 33 24 28.5 36 0 0.11 1.0 2 1894-02-05 25 7 16.0 49 0 0.00 0.0 2 1894-02-06 38 17 27.5 37 0 0.00 0.0 2 1894-02-07 45 30 37.5 27 0 0.00 0.0 1 1894-02-08 52 36 44.0 21 0 0.00 0.0 T 1894-02-09 39 33 36.0 29 0 0.76 0.0 0 1894-02-10 49 34 41.5 23 0 0.02 0.0 0 1894-02-11 42 30 36.0 29 0 0.00 0.0 0 1894-02-12 30 22 26.0 39 0 0.50 5.0 5 1894-02-13 22 18 20.0 45 0 0.64 9.0 12 1894-02-14 29 16 22.5 42 0 0.02 0.2 7 1894-02-15 37 25 31.0 34 0 0.79 6.8 6 1894-02-16 27 13 20.0 45 0 0.00 0.0 6 1894-02-17 44 11 27.5 37 0 0.00 0.0 5 1894-02-18 49 38 43.5 21 0 0.49 0.0 2 1894-02-19 42 35 38.5 26 0 0.04 0.0 1 1894-02-20 42 34 38.0 27 0 0.19 0.0 T 1894-02-21 41 30 35.5 29 0 0.00 0.0 0 1894-02-22 37 23 30.0 35 0 0.01 0.1 0 1894-02-23 29 11 20.0 45 0 0.00 0.0 0 1894-02-24 11 4 7.5 57 0 0.00 0.0 0 1894-02-25 21 1 11.0 54 0 0.01 0.1 T 1894-02-26 33 18 25.5 39 0 1.50 15.0 7 1894-02-27 38 21 29.5 35 0 0.01 0.1 5 1894-02-28 47 28 37.5 27 0 0.00 0.0 3 Sum 1013 637 - 988 0 5.15 37.9 - Average 36.2 22.8 29.5 - - - - 2.5 Normal M M M M M M M -

I was reading "Climatic Guide for New York City, New York and Nearby Areas" which was published by the United States Weather Bureau in 1958, and I was kind of surprised by how large of a discrepancy there was between the snowfall observed by the Weather Bureau at The Battery and the snowfall observed by the observer at Central Park in the 1880s and 1890s. I would consider the Weather Bureau numbers to be the "gold standard" since they were collected by actual meteorologists, and it makes me wonder if some of the old snowfall records at Central Park are underestimated. I wonder if any of the New York area climate gurus have any explanation for this? @LibertyBell@bluewave @donsutherland1 Of particular note is that 77.6" observed at the Battery for the winter of 1892-1893 - that would be a seasonal record. It seems like the discrepancy was only in the early years, with later years showing the Park generally with more snowfall than the City Office...which, to be honest, would be my expectation given the City Office would be a heat island and very near the water, versus the park-like setting at one of the highest elevations on Manhattan Island. Seasonal Snowfall at the New York City WB Office Season Snowfall (inches) 1884-1885 36.6 1885-1886 23.9 1886-1887 49.5 1887-1888 46.6 1888-1889 21.9 1889-1890 34.1 1890-1891 39.7 1891-1892 36.5 1892-1893 77.6 1893-1894 56.1 1894-1895 36.2 1895-1896 42.0 1896-1897 39.1 1897-1898 20.1 1898-1899 58.3 1899-1900 20.1 1900-1901 9.2 1901-1902 31.3 1902-1903 26.0 1903-1904 33.0 1904-1905 57.8 1905-1906 22.1 1906-1907 52.4 1907-1908 32.2 1908-1909 22.5 1909-1910 38.2 1910-1911 26.0 1911-1912 25.0 1912-1913 15.5 1913-1914 40.4

Looks like plenty of record-breaking warmth across the Midwest, so the airmass is certainly primed for it. I think these doubters probably weren't aware of that, because the media rarely makes a big deal out of record heat. But if there was record cold in these same spots, it would be 24/7 "polar vortex" hysteria from the media. It's funny some people act like the opposite is true...

That would be the term for it. Should I call it record-breaking cold? I guess you can laugh at Ben Noll of the Washington Post as well: Where storms, potential floods and record heat will hit the U.S. this week And all of these other recent media references to "record breaking heat" including in such places as the Quad Cities, Portland, Oregon and Minnesota: record breaking heat - Google Search Surely, 70s to near 80 in these places are as much a heat wave for March 10 as 90s or 100s would be in mid July.

Looks like some record-breaking heat in Iowa (76F at DSM & 72F at CID) and Nebraska (79F at OMA) as well. I only checked a few long POR sites, so there are likely multiple additional record highs.

Thank you for the update. Yes, DLH is up to 61F as of the top of the hour, setting another record. Looks like only 2 years reached 60F or better earlier [1987: reached 60F on March 6, and 69F on March 7; and 2000: reached 70F on March 7].

Here was last year’s through April 14, which should be complete for most areas. Perhaps some northern sites picked up a bit after that date. While snowfall was still rather meager, much better overall compared to last year. And 2022-2023 with final rankings. Another suck fest.

Yesterday’s tally of 3.3” matches the highest calendar day snowfall since the winter of 2021-2022. 3.3” also fell on February 16, 2024. The last time more snow fell was March 12, 2022, when 8.0” was observed.

Here is what Grok 3 had to say about this article. Grok 3's responses are in bold. Charles Krauthammer’s 2014 piece, “The Myth of ‘Settled Science,’” published in The Washington Post, takes a skeptical swing at the idea that climate science—or any science—can be definitively "settled." He argues that claiming science is beyond challenge is inherently anti-scientific, pointing to shifting climate predictions and examples like mammograms (once thought to universally reduce breast cancer deaths, later questioned by a large study) to suggest that what’s “settled” today can unravel tomorrow. His core beef is with the rhetoric of certainty—think Obama’s “the debate is settled” line—and the use of “denier” as a cudgel to shut down dissent, which he compares to religious zealotry more than rational inquiry. On one hand, he’s got a point about science not being static. The scientific method thrives on doubt, testing, and revision—Newton gets tweaked by Einstein, plate tectonics upends old geology, and yeah, climate models aren’t crystal balls. He’s right that predictions have shifted: early 2000s models overestimated near-term warming, and the so-called “pause” in global surface temperature rise from 1998 to 2013 (noted by the UK Met Office at the time) threw a wrench into the narrative of relentless ascent. Even now, models struggle with regional specifics—like whether California gets wetter or drier—because the climate’s a chaotic beast, not a tidy equation. But here’s where it starts to smell like selective skepticism. Krauthammer cherry-picks to cast doubt on the whole enterprise, not just the hype. The “pause” he harps on? It’s been dissected since—ocean heat uptake and natural variability (think El Niño cycles) explain a lot of it, and the long-term trend never stopped climbing. He name-drops physicist Freeman Dyson, who questioned climate models for ignoring biology (like vegetation’s role), but Dyson’s an outlier, not a smoking gun; his critique doesn’t dismantle the greenhouse effect’s basics, which are rooted in physics from the 19th century (Fourier, Tyndall, Arrhenius). Krauthammer admits CO2 emissions probably aren’t great, yet he sidesteps the overwhelming consensus—by 2014, studies like Cook et al. pegged 97% of climate scientists agreeing human activity drives warming. That’s not “settled” in a dogmatic sense, but it’s a hell of a lot more than a hunch. The piece also reeks of political jabs—calling scientists “white-coated propagandists” and likening climate activism to biblical wrath feels more like red meat for his audience than a good-faith dig at epistemology. He’s not wrong that pinning every drought or storm on climate change is sloppy (attribution science was fuzzier in 2014), but he overplays it to imply the whole field’s a sham. Compare that to, say, HIV causing AIDS—settled enough for treatment, yet still researched to death. Climate’s similar: the core (CO2 traps heat) holds, even if the details wiggle. So, is it a load of crap? Not entirely—it’s a sharp jab at overconfidence and groupthink, which science isn’t immune to. But it’s also a masterclass in doubt-mongering, leaning on half-truths and outliers to dodge the bigger picture. Krauthammer’s not debunking climate science; he’s poking holes in its PR. Fair enough, but it’s a stretch to call the whole thing a myth when the data’s been piling up for decades. What do you think—does his skepticism hold water, or is it just contrarian flexing? When prompted about why Krauthammer assumes that to be skeptical you must be against the idea of dangerous climate change - why can't one agree that the science isn't settled, but instead believe it will be worse than expected? You’re hitting on a key flaw in Krauthammer’s framing—he does seem to imply that skepticism automatically tilts toward rejecting climate change’s severity, which isn’t a logical necessity. Doubt cuts both ways: you could question the consensus by arguing the impacts are underestimated, not just overhyped. Imagine a scientist skeptical of current models because they fail to capture tipping points—like methane releases from permafrost or ice sheet collapse—that could make things way uglier, way faster. That’s not denial; it’s a different flavor of concern, one Krauthammer conveniently ignores to keep his narrative tight. You’re also dead-on about the “settled science” straw man. By 2014, no serious climate scientist was claiming every detail was locked down—uncertainties in cloud feedback, carbon sinks, or regional effects were openly debated in IPCC reports. The “settled” part was narrower: CO2 traps heat, humans are pumping it out, and global temps are rising as a result. Krauthammer takes that kernel of agreement, dresses it up as some unassailable monolith, then swings at it like it’s the whole story. It’s a rhetorical sleight-of-hand—exaggerate the claim, then knock it down. He’s not wrong that the “debate is over” vibe from politicians and activists can stifle legit questions. But he overplays it, acting like the scientific community’s a cult shouting down heretics, when really it’s more like a brawl over decimals—messy, but still grounded in evidence. The consensus isn’t a gag order; it’s a baseline built from decades of data (like Keeling’s CO2 curve or ice core records). Skeptics can challenge that without torching the whole edifice—say, by pushing for better models or spotlighting worst-case scenarios, as you suggest. Krauthammer’s skepticism feels more like a political wedge than a call to sharpen the science. Does that square with how you see it?

Here is what Grok 3 said when prompted with my post above:

Yeah, I would never say the "science is settled" - lots to be teased out still. Like who decided 1.5C is a "safe" level of warming? In recent years, we have breached this level, and we haven't seen temperatures this high since the Eemian thermal maximum when sea levels were 6 to 9 meters higher! What this suggests to me is sustained temperatures of 1.5C above preindustrial will, over the long run, be very dangerous. I think models suggest somewhat lower sea level rise than observed during the Eemian, which might seem contradictory, but I think this is reasonable since the Eemian warmth was driven by orbital variation and precession whereas the modern warmth is driven by an enhanced greenhouse effect. The difference being the Eemian warmth would have been more pronounced in the summertime when solar radiation is maximized, with probably surprisingly robust winters [i.e., more seasonal variation], whereas greenhouse warming is somewhat more prolific in the wintertime [i.e., when it's still cold]. This enhanced summertime warming from the solar variation would probably lead to somewhat more robust melting than an equivalent amount of greenhouse warming. I'm not sure - are there any studies that have looked into this?

I wonder when arctic sea ice maximum extent will be less than typical historical arctic sea ice minimum extent? I think historically the minimum was around 10-11 million square kilometers, now maximum is 13-14 million square kilometers. One would have to assume that, at some point in the future, the maximum sea ice extent will drop below the historical normal minimum extent. Is it safe to assume that, at that point in time, temperatures over the Arctic Ocean will be warmer in winter than they had been historically during the summertime? Because when there is sea ice cover, temperatures hover near or slightly below freezing, but without sea ice cover, the near surface temperatures will approach that of the open water.

Wow, this looks brutal. It has been above normal 19 of the last 20 months at Pittsburgh, and this would make it 25 of 26. JB seems skeptical but smart money is probably on this happening.

Special Weather Statement National Weather Service Pittsburgh PA 1004 AM EST Tue Mar 4 2025 PAZ014-020>022-029-031-073>078-041715- Butler-Beaver-Allegheny-Armstrong-Washington-Greene-Westmoreland- Higher Elevations of Westmoreland-Fayette- Higher Elevations of Fayette-Indiana-Higher Elevations of Indiana- Including the cities of Butler, Aliquippa, Beaver Falls, Ambridge, Monaca, Pittsburgh Metro Area, Kittanning, Ford City, Washington, Canonsburg, Waynesburg, Murrysville, Greensburg, New Kensington, Lower Burrell, Latrobe, Monessen, Ligonier, Donegal, Uniontown, Champion, Ohiopyle, Indiana, and Armagh 1004 AM EST Tue Mar 4 2025 ...INCREASED FIRE DANGER TODAY... Low relative humidity and fuel moisture values will impose an increased risk for fire danger this afternoon. Relative humidity values are expected to drop as low as 25% during peak heating hours across southwest Pennsylvania. In addition, southerly wind gusts to 15-20 mph at times are expected this afternoon, and this will work in tandem with the low RH values to create an increased risk for fire danger. Exercise enhanced caution with activities that involve open flames or sparks as fires can easily spread in these weather conditions. $$ MLB

And 24-hour snowfall [ending 06z Monday, March 10]:

Yes, that's not too shabby for a six hour snowfall.