CAPE

This We thought we had become NNE lol. My yard did "okay". At least had low end warning criteria snow(5"), and lots of blowing and drifting in the days that followed. Places just east of here by 10 miles had double that amount though. I really wasn't mad at all, given the previous winter results, and knowing I was about 30 miles from getting nothing.

It was a really good storm for a large area. Too much sleet at the height along/east of I-95 though. Made up for it with the great CCB snows on the backside.

Wrong storm. There were 2 being discussed. I was referring to December 2010.

The end result is it was a typical Nina screw job for most of the MA. East of the bay there was some snow(5" here) but not the foot that was supposed to fall. It was close- places in DE had 8-10, and then ofc NJ and points NE got hammered.

Gotta give the guy some credit- he manages to claim victory even as his 'discovery' fails over and over. As long as it snows a lot somewhere in the US, and at least one other weather geek on social media mentions Polar Vortex, winner!

Who is excited for SAI tracking season? Right around the corner! Nothin' like good ol' snake oil.

His data was pretty flawed as PSU pointed out. But what he was attempting to do as I recall was to make a correlation between a severely -QBO through the winter months during a Nina(may have been specifically a weak Nina) and colder temps in the east. I don't believe he was claiming it would be snowier than normal, but I really don't care enough to go back and look.

Yeah I was just having a little fun with it. December isn't that far away now, so its worth casually watching these models over the next couple months to see whats being offered up for a general long wave pattern. We know the CFS vacillates from one end of the spectrum to the other at this range, but if we start to see more favorable than unfavorable looks, it will at least keep hope alive for awhile.

CFS has sniffed it out!

Ya gotta love the swings on the CFS runs. It now has HL blocking for DJF December with the epic 'savior' Baffin block. For January and Feb the Pacific actually looks decent plus the -NAO persists. The upcoming runs will trend back towards reality.

Nice overview based on the current data/climate guidance. A lot has to be in our favor for an average to above average snowfall season in the MA, outside of the western highlands. At this juncture, there really isn't much to like in that regard. Almost every major driver/index looks as if it will be the antithesis of what we need here. We had this situation last winter, and the worst possible outcome resulted. You mentioned the solar min, and I concur that is a nebulous influence, and will certainly not offset all the other factors that may align to inhibit the development of any persistent HL blocking. What we hope for are the inevitable variations in a mostly "bad" pattern, and a bit of luck to take advantage for a fluke event or 2. Since we had zero of that last winter, maybe we are due a little.

You should get used to this possibility unless you plan to relocate. Or be more realistic with expectations and use median instead of mean.

I know this is not DC- but I am basically on the same latitude and at low elevation- and I can think of 3 warning level events right off the top of my head in the last 2 Nina winters. The one in March I think did have some blocking, but the other 2 didn't. They were both coastal scrapers with 10" plus at the beaches, about 6 here, and little to nothing for DC. Just dumb luck I suppose. eta- being further East/NE does help in a Nina with catching the edge of a Miller B sometimes. Happened here in Dec 2010 (the storm never to be mentioned). Got 5" or so from that, and there was 10+ a few miles to my east, but that period did feature a -NAO IIRC.

Blocking would be lovely, but as we all know, its pretty rare during winter lately. We could see something transient ofc, but if this winter is to feature a colder period, I am inclined to think it will probably require a favorable EPAC for a time, something like Jan of 2018. No one in DC area should expect more than a low end warning event or 2 at best, and hopefully a few 1-2" deals. That would be a major win after the debacle of last winter.

QBO won't make much difference. Its impacts are nebulous imo, and even more so in Nina. The AO/NAO is pretty much guaranteed to be positive for the winter months based on persistence and general correlation to Nina. Not to say we wont have a few periods where it is less positive or neutral. Maybe the solar minimum will save the day(winter).

Yeah a CanSIPS Dec followed by a CFS Jan and Feb would be pretty decent. A month from now we can reanalyze.This is fun.

The latest CFS runs now have a torch for December lol, but then a pretty good look for January- similar to above but better- deeper trough and hints of a bit of HL help. Looks pretty similar to h5 back in Jan of 2018 when we had the cold period(and the bomb cyclone). February doesn't look terrible either. All just for fun ofc at this juncture with these climate models.

September edition of the CanSIPS is out. My glass half full overview- Overall it looks less torchy for the winter months than the previous run. For December, not a half bad look, and verbatim just about average temps. At h5 the positive heights in the EPAC are such that the mean ridge is decently placed..close enough for perhaps a +PNA at times. Beyond that the heights shift westward in Jan, but still not a terrible look for the east coast- maybe a gradient type pattern. By Feb the EPAC ridge is a monster, max +height anomalies south of the Aleutians, and whatever winter there was would be over. Up top, December looks like a neutral AO/NAO, Jan a somewhat +AO/NAO, Feb ++AO/NAO. So not much help in the high latitudes.

Excellent write up. The bolded is the bottom line, and pretty much what I expected would be the case. Another "thought". With SSTs basin wide on fire lately, can a weak Nina even produce the same sort of atmospheric response as it would have say 20 years ago? At some point you would think a sliver of slightly negative sst anomalies would get overwhelmed, and have about the same 'impact' on the atmosphere as a neutral/warm neutral ENSO... more variable/less "typical".

Since it is pretty clear we are heading towards a weak Nina for the winter at this juncture, how many weak Ninas/cold neutrals(just to expand a bit) over say the last 50 or so years have featured a -AO/-NAO for at least a third of the winter? Not that this correlates to above normal snowfall because we already know it doesn't the majority of the time with a Nina. Just trying to gauge the prospects of at least somewhat mitigating what will probably be a less than favorable Pacific, to at least improve the odds for some decent cold periods, and perhaps luck into a few well timed fluke events. Not that we will ever actually see a -AO/NAO in winter again lol.

Sorta like my bigfoot(Daryl) analogy with a -NAO.

Likely depends on the strength of the Nina. A moderate to strong Nina and +QBO likely eliminates any chance of HL blocking. A cold neutral/weak Nina AND a severely negative QBO may allow for either some HL blocking episodes or some favorable EPO periods, providing a mechanism for cold outbreaks in the east. PSU is saying his research finds no correlation, during a Nina winter, specifically between QBO and snowfall for the MA.

Not surprising. As I have said, the QBO correlations seem nebulous, but in theory it impacts the strength of PV, and thus potentially the AO/NAO phases, so I would expect to see better correlation(-QBO) during a Nino, when HL blocking episodes are more prevalent (and we tend to get more snow).

CFS is on one of its better "runs" lately, Big picture h5 for Dec and Jan look pretty decent, and is a 'believable' look for a typical weak Nina. Feb doesn't look bad either, but with the massive +height anomalies it has in the EPAC, there would probably be more of a ridge in the east, although it also suggests a -NAO lol.

This area rarely sees big snow totals from a Nina, but can do ok with smaller events and scraps, and sometimes make it to average. That is a hell of a lot better than the crap we dealt with last winter. Ofc you have to completely tune out the fact that places further north are getting hammered from miller Bs while our region mostly gets jipped. We are who we are here, and we sure as fuuck aren't NNE.