The Scientists of NASA have revealed that August 2017 was the second hottest August in 137 years of modern record-keeping.
They also added that the measured value is “consistent with the trend in global average surface temperatures that has been observed during the past few decades.”
The NASA scientists made the disclosure while analysing monthly global temperatures. NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) does monthly analysis of global temperature using publicly available data acquired by about 6,300 meteorological stations around the world, ship- and buoy-based instruments which measure sea surface temperature, and Antarctic research stations.
According to NASA scientists, August 2017 was 0.85 degrees Celsius warmer than the mean August temperature from 1951-1980.
It was second only to August 2016 which was 0.99 degrees Celsius warmer than normal. However, the extreme temperature of August 2016 in understandable as it was affected by the 2015-2016 El Nino.
Interestingly, August 2017 was around 0.2 degrees warmer than the August 1998 which also faced the effects of the last large El Nino event in 1997-1998.
The modern record-keeping of global temperature began around 1880. The global temperatures were recorded even prior to 1800 but they did not cover major parts of the planet.
NASA, however, has clarified that monthly analyses are subject to change depending on the availability of additional data.
