Warmest spring on record for Texas

4.7 degrees above average

Matt Dietrichson, Jun 12, 12.

As more temperature records are broken across the US, it is becoming difficult to deny that our climate is changing, according to Texas Climate News:

Much of Texas has been getting something of a break from the history-making, headline-grabbing drought of 2011 in recent months, but the state’s excessive heat marches on.

All in all, temperature data through the end of May seem unlikely to be cited by many climate-change skeptics.

The figures, the NCDC reported, showed Texas had its warmest spring (March through May) on record and its third warmest January-through-May period.

Three Texas cities had their warmest January-through-May periods on record, while eight others on a list of 150 cities with long-term weather stations around the country were close to their warmest stretches for the first five months of a year.

Nationally, it was the warmest spring in the contiguous U.S. since 1895, January-through-May was the warmest such period ever, the 12 months that ended May 31 was the warmest consecutive 12 months ever, and last month was the second-warmest May.

Texas’ record average temperature this spring was 4.7 degrees above the seasonal average over 118 years of record keeping. (Last summer, the state’s average temperature was 5.3 degrees above average). The previous warmest spring in Texas was in 2006, when it was 4.3 degrees above average.

The state’s January-through-May average was 3.6 degrees warmer than the long-term average for the first five months of the year. The state’s warmest such period in 2000 was 4.1 degrees above average, while second-ranking 2006 was 3.8 degrees above average.

Adjoining states were also unusually warm. Arkansas Louisiana and Oklahoma had their warmest spring and warmest January-through-May periods, while New Mexico’s spring was its third-warmest and its January-through-May was its warmest initial five months of a year.

The three Texas cities that had their warmest January-through-May periods, along with then number of years for which records have been kept at those respective weather stations, were Amarillo (71 years), Houston (64 years) and Lubbock (66 years).

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