November 2024 second-warmest on record
An annotated map of the world plotted with the most significant climate events of November 2024. Image credit: NOAA/NCEI.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration – November 2024 was the planet’s second-warmest November in NOAA’s 175-year global climate record, just behind the record-warm November of 2023.
The NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) said November continued the year’s record-warm streak, with 2024 almost certain to end as the world’s warmest year on record.
The average global land and ocean surface temperature for November 2024 was 1.34 degrees Celsius above the 20th-century average of 12.9 C, which makes it the second-warmest November on record — just 0.08 C behind the record warmth of November 2023.
Asia had its warmest November on record, while Oceania and South America both had their second-warmest November.
The year-to-date global land and ocean surface temperature was 1.28 C above the 20th-century average, ranking as the warmest such YTD on record. Every continent had its warmest such YTD period on record, except for Asia, which had its second warmest.
NCEI’s Global Annual Temperature Rankings Outlook reported there is a greater than 99 per cent chance that 2024 will rank as Earth’s warmest year on record.
Looking at the poles, the Arctic sea ice extent for November 2024 ranked as the third-lowest November extent on record, while the Antarctic sea ice extent was the lowest on record for November.
Twelve named storms occurred across the globe in November, which ties for the most on record. The Atlantic basin saw three tropical cyclones during November, including Hurricane Rafael, which peaked as a Category 3 storm. Through the end of November there were 82 named storms worldwide in 2024, which matched the long-term average.
