Worldwide Surface Temperature Trends Since the Mid-19th Century

Abstract

Abstract Sea surface temperatures (SSTs) for the period 1856 to the present have been corrected to compensate for the use of uninsulated buckets prior to the early 1940s. Trends in the corrected SST are consistent with trends in independently corrected nighttime marine air temperatures (NMAT). Global-scale patterns of variation of annual anomalies of SST and NMAT, as revealed by the first three covariance eigenvectors, are also in close agreement. The corrected SST anomalies are also compared with those of nearby coastal and island land air temperatures. Global-scale agreement is good except in the early 20th century when the land data were relatively warm by up to 0.2°C. Proposed causes are the siting of thermometers in open-sided thatched sheds in tropical regions at that time, along with a marked tendency to warm westerly atmospheric circulation over Europe in winter. Combined fields of SST and land air temperature are presented. The relative overall coldness of the late 19th century land air temperatures appears to have arisen from inner-continental and high-latitude regions, especially in winter. Combined fields do not yield full global coverage even in the 1980s, so satellite-based SST data need to be blended carefully with the ship-based observations if monitoring of global climate is to be complete.