The NOAA just confirmed that last month (October 2015) surpassed the monthly temperature mean by the greatest amount ever — it’s not even close — nearly 1 full degree Celsius, which is 2/3 of the way to the figure beyond which cautious scientists warn will bring us catastrophic climate disruption (halfway to the more mainstream figure of 2°C).
Top 25 Monthly Temperature Departures from Average
https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2015/10/supplemental/page-2
https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/201510/supplemental/page-1
The table below lists the top 25 monthly temperature departures from the 20th century average. October 2015 was the highest monthly temperature departure on record. Out of 1630 monthly records, 7 months of 2015 are among the 10 highest monthly temperature departures from their respective averages, and all of the months of 2015 are among the 25 highest.
Rank 1 = Warmest Period of Record: 1880–2015 Month + Year Anomaly °C Anomaly °F
1 October 2015 0.98 1.76
2 September 2015 0.91 1.64
3 March 2015 0.89 1.60
4 (tie) January 2007 0.88 1.58
4 (tie) February 2015 0.88 1.58
6 (tie) June 2015 0.87 1.57
6 (tie) August 2015 0.87 1.57
8 February 1998 0.86 1.55
9 (tie) March 2010 0.85 1.53
9 (tie) May 2015 0.85 1.53
11 November 2014 0.84 1.51
12 (tie) April 2010 0.83 1.49
12 (tie) December 2014 0.83 1.49
14 January 2015 0.81 1.46
15 April 2014 0.80 1.44
16 (tie) March 2002 0.79 1.42
16 (tie) May 2014 0.79 1.42
16 (tie) August 2014 0.79 1.42
16 (tie) July 2015 0.79 1.42
20 (tie) February 2002 0.78 1.40
20 (tie) October 2014 0.78 1.40
22 (tie) December 2005 0.77 1.39
22 (tie) November 2010 0.77 1.39
22 (tie) March 2014 0.77 1.39
22 (tie) April 2015 0.77 1.39