A reader writes:
I’m a weather forecaster, and I believe in global warming. However, the images that were displayed (or at least the conclusions drawn from them) are misleading.
This winter was extremely exceptional as far as having cold airmasses coming down from the Arctic into the lower latitudes. We had historic cold in British Columbia and Pacific Northwest in November, into Britain in December, into the northeast US in January and back into the Pacific Northwest in February.
But what most people don’t realize is that the cold air in the Arctic has to be replaced from somewhere. The weather patterns that allow major Arctic outbreaks to occur also result in massive surges of warm air to move north into the polar regions. So the fact that the Arctic was incredibly warm wasn’t a surprise; it’s to be expected in circumstances like this.
This wasn’t global warming. This was weather.
Here’s a chart for another month – January 195 – that featured a massive surge of cold air into the lower latitudes. Admittedly the cold anomalies in 1950 were much more severe than in 2010-2011, but notice the maximum temperature anomaly in the arctic: +10.6
The Dish 