(Washington) The United States has just experienced its warmest winter on record, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced on Friday.
The average temperature during the meteorological winter for the contiguous United States (which notably does not include Alaska or Hawaii) was 3.1°C, the American agency said.
This “persistent heat” caused a “continued decrease in ice cover” of the Great Lakes in the northern United States, “which reached a historic low” in mid-February, NOAA noted.
A fire, the Smokehouse Creekbroke out in Texas in February, and burned more than 430,000 hectares, becoming the largest fire in the history of this southern state.
Last month alone ranked as the third warmest February in the United States, according to NOAA data going back 130 years.
Europe’s Copernicus Observatory said earlier this week that the past three months had been the hottest on record globally, with February part of a string of nine consecutive monthly records.