The rainbow-colored, animated temperature spiral that became viral for showing the rising temperature of the world for centuries will be getting a new update as a celebration for the creator's birthday. The temperature spiral shows the rise of global temperature due to the release of greenhouse gasses throughout the years.
In an article published in Live Science, temperature spiral creator Ed Hawkins added the first few months of 2017 in his creation as a celebration of his birthday last May 12. This was done despite 2017 unlikely to beat 2016 as the hottest year recorded so far.
In the new temperature spiral, it shows that each month of the year has been ranked as the second or third hottest months so far. This is a sign of how human activities still cause greenhouse gasses that have been warming up the planet.
In an article published in Long Room, Hawkins, a professor in University of Reading in the UK, created the rainbow-colored, animated temperature spiral after it was suggested by his colleague in figuring out the greenhouse gasses activities in this planet. He wrote in his blog: "It was a Friday afternoon - what else was I going to do?"
The temperature spiral is a featured graphic and eye-catching rainbow colors that show the progression of temperatures way back from the late 19th century to today. The spiral shows that it begins to approach 2°C (3.6°F) of warming from the pre-industrial era.
After posting the temperature spiral on Twitter, it spiked interest to both scientists and non-scientists, resulting to being retweeted more than 15,000 times. Currently, the graphic has already been viewed by people 3.4 million times, he claimed.
"I was particularly pleased that the graphic engaged so many non-scientists and helped them to understand the reality of our warming planet," Hawkins said. He also said that the temperature spiral was created to invoke awareness to the government about the climate of the country.
