Hotting up

In Canada they are calling it the year without a winter. From the American Midwest to the mountains of Afghanistan, this past winter has been the warmest on record. And across the planet as a whole it has been the second warmest, according to the US government’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. With a new El Niño likely to warm the waters of the Pacific in the coming months, many climatologists expect record-breaking global temperatures for 2002.