Despite North American Cold Blob, Globe Was Second Warmest In October

The western and central United States had one of their coldest Octobers on record this year.

That was a big anomaly: Pretty much all of the rest of the world was unusually warm, enough to make October, 2019, the second warmest on record for Earth as a whole.   Which goes to prove, if it's cold in your backyard, that doesn't mean climate change is canceled.

Accordig to the NOAA's National Centers for Climate Information, the central United States was the only real cold spot in a warm world last month. Says the agency:

"Record warm October temperatures were mainly present across parts of the North and Western Pacific Ocean and northeastern Canada, as well as scattered across parts of the South Atlantic Ocean, Africa, Europe, the Middle East, the Indian Ocean and South America."

Additionally, Arctic sea ice extent was the lowest on record for October.  Antarctic sea ice extent was also below normal.

Some scientists are tying the unusually cold weather in the central and western United States in October, and the record chill in the eastern two thirds of the United States so far in November to that lack of sea ice.

When the jet stream is wavier than usual - meaning bigger northward bulges toward the north and deeper dips southward, the weather gets more extreme.  A big dip in the jet stream has repeatedly set up over central North America, causing the cold waves in the United States.

Some research suggests that a lack of Arctic sea ice can make the jet stream wavier, and make it stick in more persistent patterns.  This could be one major contributing factor making muh of the United States cold while most of the rest of the world bakes.

I would add that this research still isn't conclusive. Plus, with or without climate change, there is still going to be variability in weather and climate month to month and in different locations.  Climate change does not cancel out other factors that can influence the weather in your back yard, as I've already noted.

On top of all this, the year 2019 so far is the second warmest on record for the Globe.  Highlighting the persistence of weather patterns this year, it looks like parts of the central United States will be an outlier.  The whole year has been generally chilly in that part of the world.

Usually and traditionally,  when global temperatures are near record highs, there's an El Nino pattern going on, which is a warming of the eastern Pacific Ocean off South America.  El Ninos tend to make the world a little hotter than it otherwise would be. But there's no El Nino going on now, which makes the October heat pretty impressive.

November, as we well know, has been brutally cold around here in Vermont. Still, I bet on a global basis, the current month will be another very warm one.