snowman19

That MEI number is proof of a very well coupled (ocean-atmosphere) La Niña

My question is this….Are we possibly missing an elephant in the room here? I think there is another underlying reason other than the virtually nonexistent STJ (from La Niñas) that the last couple of winters have had a total lack of “KU”, coastal bombs in this region….the Gulf Stream. Look at how anomalously far south/east and well off shore it has been….it pushes the baroclinic zone way far east and south. Also, the unusual, very cold waters off shore along the northeast and mid-Atlantic coast from all the arctic cold and very strong NWerly wind events we’ve been seeing. In response, the baroclinic zone is way south and east, well off shore along the displaced Gulf Stream

@40/70 Benchmark I’m assuming you disagree with Eric’s take that there’s going to be a big SPV strengthening then coupling with the troposphere leading to +AO/+NAO late winter into spring?

The 16-17 Niña matched this one pretty close….weak Niña, very strong -IOD that peaked in the fall, then a rapid, total Niña collapse in January, 2017 with a massive WWB and a record SOI crash (remains to be seen if this one has the big SOI crash and record WWB comparable to that January)…. @GaWx @PhiEaglesfan712

I’m becoming very confident that there is going to be a SE ridge for February, the question will be how much of a SE ridge that month?

The risk I see is that the -EPO ridge sets up too far to the west (post 1/20) and causes a trough over the west coast

Yea, I would expect a different story in New England since you guys do better in Nina’s

At least in my area, there have really been no blockbuster February’s for snow during La Nina’s going all the way back to the 1950’s. Really the only lone exception was 2013-14, but that was cold-neutral not La Niña. March however is a different story….

This is showing a strong SE ridge signal for February:

I was just thinking the same thing. At least for my area (35 miles NW of NYC), there have been some epic March’s for snowfall and cold during -ENSO/La Niña (i.e. 2018). February though? Not so much

Not a clue yet. Wayyyy too early

No one in their right mind is going to argue that this Niña isn’t collapsing or that we aren’t going to see a substantial El Niño develop this spring, granted. My issue is this fantasy going around twitter (NOT saying Webb is saying this) that a full blown El Niño pattern is going to take over by February. That wishcast is going to go down in flames and it’s completely preposterous. It takes months for the atmosphere to flip from one completely different ENSO state to another. There is always a lag of months, no matter what. And it’s not going to reach the El Niño threshold (+0.5C) in region 3.4 until probably late spring, if not early summer

100%. The STJ has been virtually non existent so far. Definitely one (top) factor, the other being the very southward displaced Gulf Stream and very cold waters off shore along the northeast and mid-Atlantic coast from all the arctic cold and very strong NWerly wind events we’ve been seeing. In response, the baroclinic zone is way south and east along the anomalously displaced Gulf Stream

@40/70 Benchmark @Bluewave @DonSutherland1 I’m wondering if this accounts for part of the lack of KU events? It’s been occurring since 2022. Look at how far off shore and south it forces the baroclinic zone