January Declared Second-Warmest in 35 Years

Astronaut Chris Hadfield Earth Photo — Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield snapped this photo of Earth from space from the International Space Station during the Expedition 34 mission. The January 2013 photo shows Newfoundland and Labrador from orbit.

(Image credit: Chris Hadfield/Canadian Space Agency via @Cmdr_Hadfield)

As a blizzard makes its way toward the Northeast, numbers suggest the world is actually pretty hot, with temperatures across the globe making last month the second warmest January in the past 35 years.

Globally, January had an average temperature that was 0.92 degrees Fahrenheit (0.51 degrees Celsius) above a 30-year baseline average, said John Christy, a professor of atmospheric science and director of the Earth System Science Center at The University of Alabama in Huntsville.

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During the past month, the globe's coldest spot centered on Russia, near the town of Nyagan, where temperatures averaged about 4.5 degrees F (2.51 degrees C) below seasonal norms there. Meanwhile, as compared with seasonal norms, the Norwegian Arctic archipelago of Svalbard (located north of Norway and east of Greenland) showed the warmest temps in January. There, the thermometer rose some 7.4 degrees F (4.1 degrees C) above January norms.

The global numbers are part of an ongoing project between the University of Alabama, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and NASA. Instruments aboard NOAA and NASA satellites measure the temperature of the atmosphere from Earth's surface to an altitude of about 5 miles (8 kilometers) above sea level. Once processed, the monthly temperature data is placed in a publicly available computer file.

Jeanna Bryner is managing editor of Scientific American. Previously she was editor in chief of Live Science and, prior to that, an editor at Scholastic's Science World magazine. Bryner has an English degree from Salisbury University, a master's degree in biogeochemistry and environmental sciences from the University of Maryland and a graduate science journalism degree from New York University. She has worked as a biologist in Florida, where she monitored wetlands and did field surveys for endangered species, including the gorgeous Florida Scrub Jay. She also received an ocean sciences journalism fellowship from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. She is a firm believer that science is for everyone and that just about everything can be viewed through the lens of science.