Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - Global Temperature Extremes

Episode Date: July 11, 2021

Every so often you might hear something on the news about a record high or low temperature being set. Usually, these might be records for a particular month, or maybe for a particular place. Temperature records, especially global records, can be very contentious and there are rigid rules surrounding how such recordings are taken. Some temperature records might take years to be verified. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Every so often, you might hear something on the news about a record high or record low temperature being set. Usually, these might be records for a particular month or maybe for a particular place. Temperature records, especially global records, can be very contentious, and there are rigid rules surrounding how such recordings are taken. Some temperature records might take years to be verified. Learn more about global temperature records and how they're measured and verified on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. What if your perceptions about the past were wrong?

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www.com slash Skillshare. The keeping of temperature records only dates back to around 1800. That was when the World Meteorological Organization began keeping records. The organization was initially established in 1873 as a forum for countries to share weather data, but today it's an agency under the United Nations. Early weather observations weren't necessarily bad or wrong, but they also weren't necessarily very accurate or precise. Most early temperature record keeping wasn't intended for the

purpose of advanced meteorology. It was simply a log that was kept at a military base or by some private citizens. Temperature extremes usually occur in particular places during particular events during particular times of the year, and this really shouldn't come as a surprise to anybody. Super high temperatures almost always occur in a desert, in the summer, in the middle of a heat wave. Super low temperatures will usually occur at extreme latitudes and somewhere far away from the sea, as large bodies of water tend to moderate temperatures by serving as a heat sink. To illustrate some of the problems keeping temperature records, let's take a look at what used to be the global record high temperature.

The recording which formerly held the record was 57.8 degrees Celsius or 136 degrees Fahrenheit. This temperature was taken on September 13, 1922, in Azea, Libya, which is about 40 kilometers south of Tripoli. Most people might just hear that fact, and that's it. However, when this record was investigated by the World Meteorological Organization, there were a whole bunch of problems. The documentation of the record was nothing more than a daily temperature log kept at an Italian military outpost.

It wasn't until years later that anyone noticed that it was any sort of record, and there was nothing special about the temperature which was indicated at the time of recording. The actual log where the temperature was recorded is available online, and if you look at it, you can see some obvious problems. Just a few days before the record was set, someone knew, and we have no idea who the person was, began doing the recordings. Not only was the handwriting different,

but they had screwed up the columns where you put the daily high and daily low temperatures. Moreover, once the new person had started doing the recordings, there was an unexplained, sudden major increase in high and low temperatures. Now, it's certainly possible that on the same day that this new guy took over the recordings that there was a huge spike in temperatures. However, the type of thermometer which was used is called a sixth thermometer. This is a U-shaped thermometer with the left side showing the low temperatures and the right side showing the high temperatures. There is a piece

of metal on either end of the mercury that is moved by the mercury to reflect the high or low temperatures. All you have to do is look at the end of the day to see where the metal bars are and you can record the daily high and daily low temperatures. That is, you have to make a measure where the bottom of the metal bar is because that's the part that touched the mercury. It appears that the soldier who took the reading, who messed up the high and low temperature columns, was probably reading the top of the bar, not the bottom. That could result in a mass of 7 degrees Celsius or 12.6 degree Fahrenheit difference in the recorded temperature versus the actual temperature.

Soon after this temperature became public, some meteorologists began to question it. For starters, it's very unusual for such a high temperature to be recovered. recorded so close to the sea. As I mentioned before, the oceans tend to moderate temperatures. Second, none of the other weather stations around Azea recorded anything close to what this station did. In the 1950s, the Libyan Weather Service actually came out doubting the temperature, and it was officially invalidated in 2012 by the World Meteorological Organization. That made the new record high temperature a recording from 1913 in Furness Creek, Death Valley, California. that record is 56.7 degrees Celsius or 134.1 degrees Fahrenheit.

However, this temperature also had a lot of controversy surrounding it, and many people think that it might be 2.2 to 2.8 degrees Celsius or 4 to 5 degrees Fahrenheit too high. So if we take out that record, what then is the highest temperature? And that would be an even 54 degrees Celsius or 129.2 degrees Fahrenheit. that temperature has been recorded several times at Furnace Creek in Death Valley in 2013, Mitraba in Kuwait in 2016, and Turbot Pakistan in 2017. However, there has been an unverified 54.4 degrees Celsius, or 129.9 degrees Fahrenheit recorded at Furnace Creek in both 2020 and 2021. So, how are these temperatures recorded?

There are actually three different types of temperature records that exist. air temperature, ground temperature, and satellite temperature. Air temperature is what's usually given when you hear the temperature on the news. Officially, an air temperature recording is measured at 1.5 meters or 4 feet 11 inches off of the ground, and it has to be in the shade. That's why you'll often hear about high temperatures being taken in the shade. The other type of temperature is ground temperature. Ground temperatures can be significantly higher than air temperatures.

There are no official records for ground temperatures, but the highest reported ground temperature was also at Furnace Creek in 1972. They recorded a temperature on the ground of 93.9 degrees Celsius or 201 degrees Fahrenheit. That is getting very close to the boiling point of water. The third type of temperature measurement is satellite measurements. Obviously, you can't have thermometers everywhere on the surface of the Earth. satellites can cover more of the earth, but their temperatures aren't considered as reliable. The highest temperature ever recorded by satellite was recorded in 2005 in the Lut Desert in Iran. It recorded a whopping 70.7 degrees Celsius or 159.3 degrees Fahrenheit.

I've mentioned Furnace Creek in Death Valley several times. What makes this place so hot? It mostly has to do with its elevation and its location. It's 282 feet below sea level. Unlike other places on Earth that are below sea level, Death Valley is surrounded by high mountains. Not only is Death Valley the lowest point in the United States, but it's very close to Mount Whitney, which is the highest point in the continental United States. The mountains trap heat in Death Valley, and it just circulates keeps getting hotter. If you ever visit Death Valley National Park, which I highly recommend, you can stop at the Furnace Creek Visitor Center and see where they take their temperature readings.

I mentioned earlier how the sea can mitigate temperatures. The fact that illustrates this better than anything else I can think of is that if you rank all of the U.S. states and territories by their highest temperature ever, the state with the lowest high temperature is, believe it or not, Hawaii. Even Alaska has had a higher temperature than Hawaii. So far, I've only talked about high temperatures, but there are, of course, records for low temperatures as well. The coldest temperature ever registered at a recording station

was taken on July 21st, 1983, at the Soviet Vostok Restart Station in Antarctica. The temperature was minus 89.2 degrees Celsius or minus 128.6 degrees Fahrenheit. Vostok station is sort of the opposite of Death Valley in that it is the perfect place for ultra-cold weather. For starters, it's in Antarctica, which is obviously cold. Most importantly, Vostok is located near the Antarctic Pole of inaccessibility. If you remember back to my episode on Extreme Places, the pole of inaccessibility is the point that is furthest from the ocean. On top of all of that, Vostok Station is sitting at an elevation of approximately 3,500 meters or 11,500 feet.

Here too, the coldest recorded satellite temperature is even lower. In 2010, a temperature of minus 93.2 degrees Celsius or minus 135.8 degrees Fahrenheit was recorded over Antarctica. There's one final observation I'll make about temperature extremes. We haven't really been recording temperatures for that long in the big scheme of things. Even if we include the 1913 Death Valley record, that's only a little over 100 years ago. There weren't even serious research stations in Antarctica until after World War II. That means that all of our records are really only records from the modern era. It's highly unlikely that the highest and lowest temperatures we've recorded over the last 100 years

are the highest and lowest temperatures that the earth has seen, even within the last several thousand years. That being said, the data we have is the data we have. It isn't perfect, but it's all we got. The associate producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is Thor Thompson. If you'd like to support the show, please donate over at patreon.com. There is content only available to supporters, merchandise, and even opportunities for a show producer credit.

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