July - 2006 - 2nd Hottest on Record in US

July 2006 Broke U.S. Heat Records

ASHEVILLE, North Carolina, August 7, 2006 (ENS) - The continental United States sweltered through the second hottest July on record because of a blistering heat wave from California to Washington, DC, according to the the NOAA National Climatic Data Center in Asheville.

The hottest July on record occurred in 1936, during the Dust Bowl years, and the third hottest was 1934.

The July 2006 heat wave broke more than 2,300 daily temperature records for the month and eclipsed more than 50 records for the highest temperatures in any July, the data shows.

The first seven months of 2006 was the warmest January-July of any year the United States since records began in 1895, NOAA climate data indicates.

NOAA scientists said that no single episode of extreme heat can be blamed exclusively on human-induced global warming, but instead heat waves will become more likely and progressively more intense over the course of decades

The scorching temperatures, combined with a shortage of rainfall, expanded moderate-to-extreme drought conditions in areas already hard hit.

The average July 2006 temperature for the continental United States was 77.2 degrees F (25.1 C). More than 90 records for the highest night-time temperatures for July were broken.

The average January - July 2006 temperature was 55.3 degrees F (12.9 C), which beat the previous record set in 1934.

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Nearly the entire country was hotter than normal. Esp. the Northwest - California and Idaho, Montana and the Dakotas. The Texas and Florida coasts and a few other isolated spots were the exceptions. NOAA maps.

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Meanwhile - as part of the disinformation campaign - an anti-Al Gore/Global Warming video that came out on YouTube in an attempt to influence people on the blogosphere - while made to look amateurish - was really made by DCI - the same GOP PR firm that Exxon Mobile uses. Exxon Mobile has been getting a reputation as the primary funder of global warming disinformation.

According to EXXPOSE EXXON - Between 1998 and 2005, ExxonMobil spent $19 million to fund organizations working to undermine efforts to cut global warming pollution.

For more on Exxon funding global warming skepticism see exxonsecrets.org.

Graph of Global Mean Temperatures 1880-2004.