Ten Billion-Dollar Plus Weather, Climate Disasters Hit U.S. in 2015

Record December elevated 2015 to 2^nd warmest year for US 48  —NOAA

The 2015 annual average U.S. temperature was 54.4°F (12.4°C), 2.4°F above the 20^th century average, the second warmest year on record.

• Warmest year for U.S. was  2012  with an average temperature of 55.3°F.
• 2015 was the 19^th consecutive year the annual average temperature exceeded the 20^th century average.

The average contiguous U.S. precipitation was 34.47 inches (87.55cm), 4.53 inches above average, and ranked as the third wettest year in the 121-year period of record.

• Only 1973 and 1983 were wetter.
• The national drought footprint shrank about 10 percent last year.

Ten weather and climate disaster events with losses exceeding $1 billion each occurred  across the United States in 2015. These events included

• Drought (1 event)
• Flooding (2)
• Severe storms (5)
• Wildfire (1)
• Winter Storm (1)

The 1980–2015 annual average is 5.2 events (CPI-adjusted); the annual average for the most recent 5 years (2011–2015) is 10.8 events (CPI-adjusted), said NCDC/NOAA.

Additionally, the U.S. experienced five distinct disaster event types in 2015. It is more common to observe three or four disaster event types in a given year. Five or more disaster event types exceeding $1 billion in the same year occurs less frequently (i.e., 2015, 2011, 2008, 1998, 1994 and 1989).

U.S. climate highlights: 2015

• Florida, Montana, Oregon and Washington were record warm.
• Alaska, California, and Idaho had their second warmest year.
• Twenty-one other states were much warmer than average.
• 14 States were much wetter than average.
• Oklahoma and Texas were record wet for the year, and became drought free for the first time since 2010.
• The U.S. Climate Extremes Index (USCEI) for 2015 was 70 percent above average, ranking as the fourth highest annual USCEI in the 106-year record and highest since 2012.

U.S. climate highlights: December 2015

• December 2015 was record warm for the contiguous U.S., with a temperature of 38.6°F, 6.0°F above the 20^th century average.
  • Previous record of 37.7°F was set in 1939.
  • 29 Eastern states had the warmest December on record.
  • No state was record cold.
• The December precipitation total for the contiguous U.S. was 3.93 inches, 1.58 inches above the 20^th century average, ranking as the wettest December on record.
  • Previous record of 3.76 inches was set in 1982.
  • Above-average precipitation occurred across the country
  • 23 States were much wetter than average.
  • Iowa and Wisconsin had a record wet December.

Source: NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, State of the Climate: National Overview for December 2015, published online January 2016, retrieved on January 9, 2016 from http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/national/201512.