I remember that well. The hype from JB in mid-late February was off the charts that winter. He was calling for a record-breaking cold and snowy March in the east, “March Madness!” and was using 1888, 1958, 1960 and 1993 as the analogs
It would appear that the trend we saw since November of the models getting colder as we get closer in time has finally ended this month. Sunday continues to warm on the models. Last week overperformed too
After what was basically wall to wall arctic cold from the end of November into the first couple of days of March, I’d say the overwhelming majority of people in the east are ready for spring now. The Equinox is only 4 days away
We basically had wall to wall arctic cold from late November into the 1st couple of days of March. We had major snowstorms starting in December, a record breaking blizzard and months of constant snow cover. Also had frozen over lakes for months. By far and away the best winter since 2014-15. I can’t believe people are actually upset that it’s ending
Thankfully normal highs are well in the 50’s in the NYC metro area now that we’re in spring, so those depicted negative departures are not actually “cold”
The 97-98 super Nino winter actually wasn’t a huge torch. It was just too warm to snow. There were a bunch of coastal storms with temps in the 30’s. The problem was it was extremely east-based, region 1+2 was over +4.0C, a secondary area of convective forcing formed there, which completely displaced the Aleutian Low over Alaska (++EPO) and the EPO floodgates were wide open all winter long with PAC air inundating Canada and the CONUS
If (IF) there’s actually a super El Niño (region 3.4 over +2.0C), it’s very, very unlikely to be a cold winter. Snow is a different matter, since one major KU can skew the entire winter (i.e., 82-83, 15-16). 97-98 was a total dud for snow obviously