March 2012 was second hottest yet for South Carolina

NOAA
Record and near-record breaking temperatures dominated the eastern two-thirds of the nation. This animation shows the locations of each of the 7,755 daytime and 7,517 nighttime records (or tied records) in sequence over the 31 days in March.

Remember how warm it was in March? 

Well, it was the warmest March on record yet for the contiguous United States, and the second warmest for South Carolina, a record that dates back to 1895.

In all, record and near-record breaking temperatures dominated the eastern two-thirds of the nation — watch those heat pops flare in the video up top.

North Myrtle Beach saw one day of record heat of 88° on March, 29th, see the state wide records for March here.

Across the contiguous United States the average temperature of 51.1° was 8.6 degrees above the 20th century average for March and 0.5° warmer than the previous warmest March in 1910. Of the more than 1,400 months (117+ years) that have passed since the U.S. climate record began, only one month, January 2006, has seen a larger departure from its average temperature than March 2012.

This winter was also recorded as the fourth warmest yet.

So far, it seems as though this was not a warming that was shared across the globe — while the rest of the world was on the warm side it was not to the same extent, instead the warming in the states is being attributed to a fluke in weather patterns — perhaps it was the migration wave of the South Carolina state bird, errr, mosquitoes that carried the heat.

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