so_whats_happening

5 hours ago, griteater said:

VP image for Mar 19 to Jun 19 of this year.  Uplift max in W Pac / Subsidence max in C Amer

 

 

VP image for Jun 19 to Sep 19 of this year.  Uplift max W of Dateline / Subsidence max in far E Pac and W Indian Ocean

 

 

VP image for Jun to Sep for Strong and Super Ninos (ONI) since 1980.  Uplift max E of Dateline / Subsidence max in Indonesia

 

 

VP image for Jun to Sep for Moderate Ninos (ONI) since 1980.  Uplift max near and E of Dateline / Subsidence max in Indonesia and Far E Indian Ocean

 

 

VP image for Jun to Sep for Weak Ninos (ONI) since 1980.  Uplift max near and E of Dateline / Subsidence max in Far W Indian Ocean and E Africa

 

 

VP image for subsequent winter (Nov to Feb) for the same Weak Ninos (ONI) since 1980.  Uplift max near Dateline and Indian Ocean / Subsidence max in the Caribbean  

 

 

Bottom Lines:

1. The low frequency VP pattern (3 months or more) this year hasn't changed much going back to March. 

2. The Jun to Sep VP pattern this year is most similar to Weak El Ninos (ONI) when comparing with all El Ninos since 1980.

3. My guess is that the low frequency VP pattern this winter will be similar to the Weak El Nino winter composite with an uplift max along the Dateline and a subsidence max in the Carribean and South America.

4. My guess is that the MJO will become more active this winter and will play a substantial role in the subseasonal / monthly pattern

5. The persistent and strong subsidence region over C America / Carribean / Gulf of Mexico this year is noteworthy and may have contributed to the extensive summer warmth in AZ/NM/TX/LA.

This does seem to be the case for this Nino, in past Nino events we don't often see the stronger subsidence in this region it tends to be weaker and further displaced into SA and tropical Atlantic while the stronger subsidence tends to be more located in the maritime region. I would have to look at past years with similar stronger subsidence regardless of ENSO state to see if we had similar results to that. Maybe a project for the rainy day tomorrow.

3 hours ago, ORH_wxman said:

Here is 2001-2015 winter temps compared to the previous 15 years....climate change was happening during all of this, yet much of the central and eastern US was colder in the mean. We wouldn't claim it is due to global cooling...we would claim it is due to natural variation on top of the underlying warming trend....it happened to overwhelm it during that period relative to the previous 15 years.

So yeah, it's not unreasonable at all to say that some of the warming the northeast has seen since 2015 is due to natural variation putting us in a more unfavorable pattern. I also reject that the pattern becomes more permanent. But we'll see. Maybe this is the one that actually does and all the others that failed to stay consistent (warm blobs, -AO due to sea ice, etc) were just flawed research.

 

How would this compare to a different climo baseline? Just curious if these changes occur differently in say the 1981-2010 or 1971-2000 base lines. It would make sense for earlier times to look cooler based on a much higher climo baseline than previous. Basically the signatures may still be there but not as extreme?

48 minutes ago, raindancewx said:

Looking back, there are actually quite a few stronger El Ninos with active hurricane seasons in September. Another silly example of forcing not being used correctly to me.

We're at about 65 ACE, and it will grow somewhat more with the storm to hit the Carolinas. A bit ahead of the most active El Ninos in the previous warm AMO cycle. But not dramatically. Most of you seem wedded to the idea that years like 1965 and 1957 were well coupled El Ninos, but of course, the 30-year average ACE in September for 1935-64 is something like 44. The 1991-2020 average is more like 60-ish. So we're not even as far above the recent average as those older strong El Ninos like 1957 and 1965 that I think everyone agrees are well coupled in other ways. A lot of El Ninos actually have pretty impressive early season hurricanes and total activity, call it June-September, and then die prematurely in October from what I can see.

https://psl.noaa.gov/gcos_wgsp/Timeseries/Hurricane/hurr.atl.ace.data

1951: 57.8 ACE in September

1953: 58.6 ACE in September

1957: 63.7 ACE in September

1965: 60.9 ACE in September

2002: 46.8 ACE in September

2003: 111.1 ACE in September (if considered an El Nino)

2004: 155.0 ACE in September

2006: 59.6 ACE in September

2018: 72.8 ACE in September

2019: 93.4 ACE in September

Happen to have one for the EPAC and WPAC? Also there at least looks to be another hurricane on the horizon for the last week of the month. After that is anybody's guess.

On 6/14/2023 at 3:59 PM, so_whats_happening said:

Honestly will have to wait and see. We might not get a reaction until July which a few days is semantics of course. We also need to see just how influential the WWB will actually be. If we take this last one for example which was still a rather impressive event we rose a solid .5 degree not shabby at all but since have cooled that area by half the warming that occurred. Im still hesitant on going anything above 2C as that would require more robust WWB events and an actual dislodging of the subsurface warm pool. We have about 4 months until we hit peak typically seen with El Nino events. At the rate we have been going it has been about .3C increase each month since February. If this rate continues we look to be about .9-1.2 for July average, 1.2-1.5 August, 1.5-1.8 for September average and maybe if we arent on the cooler side of things pushing near 2C in October. Thoughts are definitely pinned around 1.7-1.8C in 3.4 currently so while we push into strong territory the atmospheric response may be more on the moderate Nino side of things. We seem to be on the 30 day kick for WWB events with larger pushes happening every 80-90 days (late february/early march and late may).

Lets see how it goes.

While looking for pictures to save in my folder I stumbled upon this doesn't seem it has strayed too far off the idea. I don't have monthly numbers but judging where we are now we have pushed into the middle of the ranges compared to the lower end back in June/July area.

Lets see what it can muster up here in the next 1-2 months. Totally based this thought on the idea of an October peak looks likely still a November peak but will have to wait and see. Looks like my monthly thought in the other thread of 1.6 for October may be a bit off depending on how things shake out.

25 minutes ago, snowman19 said:

I agree and people can say how weak this El Niño is all they want….fact is Nino 3.4 has risen +2.5C in 10 months, that is pretty incredible: https://x.com/WorldClimateSvc/status/1704929580614594969?s=20

I mean yea it is impressive but it also has been done before, unfortunately this year does not have the amount of crazy KW/ WWB events to allow the subsurface to take it to that upper echelon like 1997 and 2015. Unless we see a rather shocking change of events come about we probably won't hit much of those upper levels that some models are showing. Still got a solid month though.

4 hours ago, bluewave said:

Yeah, my guess is that is why the CFS thinks the El Niño is peaking now and doesn’t show the typical increase that we usually get in the late fall. Not that the CFS or any of these seasonal models are that great since they just seem to repeat the initial conditions. But it is enough for the CPC to mention with all the other model data in their latest weekly update. If the El Niño doesn’t get much stronger or just levels off instead of declining, then the MEI may not get much above the weak to maybe moderate range. Our winter forecast could again come down to competing influences with perhaps a mix of Nino-like and La Niña elements. So getting a -AO and +PNA will be necessary as an insurance policy if the tropical forcing becomes more variable. 
 

https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf

 

Maybe? Unfortunately I have not followed much about how models have been predicting things over the spring and summer other than what is posted on here. There have been a few instances in which the 3.4 region has peaked early, but im not sold yet that has occurred this go around. Almost feel like what may happen is overall rate of warming may be slowing a bit and subsurface continues to slosh around helping sustain things, maybe we poke close to 2C for a month but at this point I would bet the under to come to fruition.

If we do indeed see any bit of cooling occur in 3.4 over the next 2-3 weeks we can safely assume we probably are damn near peak. The lack of anything showing up in long range is rather interesting to watch unfold though, have yet to see the typical westerly anomalies show up in the eastern IO which has been the thing for this season.

Just the very idea that WWB have been originating in the Eastern IO versus maritime/ extreme west Pacific tells me already the forcing is going to be west of the typical El Nino placement. 

4 hours ago, snowman19 said:

@Gawx @griteater @Bluewave @so_whats_happening @40/70 Benchmark @brooklynwx99 @raindancewx @Terpeast  The BOM has just declared that an El Niño is underway and that it is coupling with the atmosphere. It has also declared that a coupled +IOD is underway. Here is the new detailed discussion: http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/enso/

They are expecting a super, trimonthly (NDJ) ONI event, here are the month by month graphs: http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/model-summary/#region=NINO34&tabs=Pacific-Ocean

I would assume these values are based off the BOMM/ BOMA model? If so this is the same model that has been having wild MJO swings when we did have MJO activity it showed amplitudes much greater than anything actually occurring and when we had null or very low amplitude for MJO the model was always pushing it to go over to 7-8-1-2 region with moderate amplitude when we have barely poked out from null most of late spring and summer.

I respect BOM as they have a great catalogue of information to use and monitor everything within their website instead of going to several different sites for info, but I will say the model has been off by quite a bit all season just as much as the infamous CFS has been off. It is still reasonable to think that models just happened to get this one wrong and that is perfectly fine. Models are meant to be used as guidance for an outcome not certainties for a forecast.

I will personally wait to see how things go but if by mid to late October (which is a little less than month from now) we don't see rather drastic changes having occurred into more persistent WWB events (which are a rather important aspect in El Nino formation and sustainability) to sustain subsurface and surface temps regardless of SOI or IOD connections we can surely look back and say models were a little too overzealous. 

What this means for winter well that is anyone's guess as we have very few scenarios with such an occurrence as we have seen. 

49 minutes ago, GaWx said:

 The late August peak was ~Aug 25th, which coincides with the first image in this animation (average of 5 days ending Aug 27th). From then to just about all of the way to the end, this animation mainly shows slow cooling and still doesn’t show any signs of another round of significant rewarming being imminent at the end. In contrast the loops ending in early August clearly showed strong rewarming about to commence, which of course happened. There’s still time (~remainder of autumn) but I’m admittedly saying to myself “hmmm” because I didn’t expect a 3 week long slow cooling/pause along with still no sign of it ending. And now BoA finally cooled significantly for its 3.4 peak and thus joined the cooling vs one month ago runs party although @snowman19correctly pointed out that it’s initialization was too cool.

Yea Ill continue to keep gathering the images and making a gif from them. I honestly wish I had the images from March through now. As of now the WPAC is in steady state no warming or cooling taking place. The EPAC is cooling from some upwelling the expansion of the 2C subsurface temps has been interesting to watch but we seem to be losing that +4 to +5C subsurface again. I don't wanna make the statement that we have peaked in oceanic heat content but going from last year at this time to the peak heat content this year has been about 2.4C change which is impressive if we had been more coupled early on I believe we could have easily been sitting firmly in Super Nino range. I think the best thing to come of this is to maintain SST anomalies as we move into Fall and the early portion of winter. October still to come but at this point September does not show any support for a WWB event to try and start up.

The EPAC hurricane season continues to be dead which is another weird sign for an El Nino in progress. The Atlantic may need to be watched still coming up here as we move into the end of the month early October. As Bluewave has stated there are just too many mixed signals competing right now I guess it goes to say MEI may have the right tune in how things are even with how warm the waters are globally and at the equator. Either way going to be very interesting to see what happens this winter.

Even if we don't get a decent MJO response, which should be the case if we do indeed have a strong ENSO event, I would want to see it weak and over in 8-1-2 not hanging out in 3-4 and null like it has been recently that just helps allow a more Nina like atmosphere take hold. Most forecasts keep it in null at this point to about the first week of October. I personally am not a big fan of using super long range modeling forecasts hence my issues from the wildly large 3.4 peaks many models were showing but the lead up is still important to watch take hold.

I am actually rooting for the Atlantic to have one more hurricane, maybe major, that can knock the waters down more across the West Atlantic. Preferably a Gulf/ Caribbean storm would be great but that leads to landfall issues so do not want it for those individuals.

Latest U wind totals and forecast to the end of the month. These do not typically work out to what is shown but the idea still stands of trades staying put with no westerlies in the IO or Maritime region to potentially start something.

I sure hope the warm anomalies can hold along the west coast from BC down to Cali. Also here is the latest TAO subsurface animation August 27th to Sept 17th.

30 minutes ago, snowman19 said:

Here is what makes me confident that we see a period of strong, rapid strengthening of this El Nino come October. This +IOD event is quickly gaining strength, is exceeding the latest forecasts and is very likely to become an overperformer, possibly by a lot. In addition, there is very good atmospheric coupling. +IOD constructively interferes with Nino development: https://x.com/selwyyyyn/status/1702714891210195266?s=46&t=NChJQK9_PUjA1K7D2SMojw

Why are they comparing it to 2019? Because this was the last big +IOD pattern, wouldn't it be better to compare it to a stronger Nino pattern? 

56 minutes ago, griteater said:

Yeah, that's really weird.  I don't recall seeing that in the past.  You can set your interval and range on the entry page...but not sure why the ranges are missing on the output

Yea the issue still remains even when you change the interval and range you still don't get a bar. Unfortunately they do not list what default settings they use in their info. I can guesstimate it but can't get it to quite look like theirs but it at least gives me a better idea knowing the interval and ranges when I change it up, so that helps.

1 hour ago, griteater said:

Good link here for SST re-analysis - psl.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/gcos_wgsp/printpage.pl

You can compare older years against its climate period.  Image below is Oct-Dec 1955 compared against 1930-1960...hardcore -PDO & La Nina

So only issue I have with this is where are the anomaly ranges?

27 minutes ago, griteater said:

Good link here for SST re-analysis - psl.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/gcos_wgsp/printpage.pl

You can compare older years against its climate period.  Image below is Oct-Dec 1955 compared against 1930-1960...hardcore -PDO & La Nina

For DJF purposes this was the 1956 to their baseline climo as compared to 2023 compared to the default used. Tried to use a similar difference in comparison between the two.

17 minutes ago, griteater said:

Good link here for SST re-analysis - psl.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/gcos_wgsp/printpage.pl

You can compare older years against its climate period.  Image below is Oct-Dec 1955 compared against 1930-1960...hardcore -PDO & La Nina

Wonderful! Thank you very much.

You can see how the pressure tendencies change with water temps.

55 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Well, higher heights over the poles means a weaker PV.....but the catch is that what cold there is will be more readily available to the mid latitudes. However, given the depth of the trough in the west, the vast majority funneled out there.

 

Bolded: absolutely that should be a well known idea at this point no differentiation in opinion on that subject. Higher heights unfortunately all year round in conjunction warming oceans leaves with less severe cold outbreaks.

What dictates trough orientation is other things involved and most certainly the pacific pattern influenced it this past year in comparison to a year of similar status. You can see the difference in temp profiles across the US between the two years although scale is different, on the colder end as already discussed, but here nor there you get the idea. Here are the pressure anomalies in comparison you can see weaker pacific high pressure potential and more prominent troughing pattern across the north pacific from Sea of Okhotsk to much of the Bering sea driving it right down the west coast. Where as in 55/56 you had a much stronger high pressure region having cold spill into West Pacific/ Japan and another coming from the north Canada/Alaska region to the Pac NW.

1 minute ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

To me, its clear 2023 had a slightly deeper RNA trough. Also, some of the snowfall is just simple variance due to the chaos of the atmosphere. We def. had some bad synoptic breaks last season independent of global warming.

I think we can both agree the west Pacific played a significant role in how the winter went down in both scenarios given a fairly similar stance in large scale patterns such as ENSO/PDO. The only thing I have ever found with higher heights over the poles is less cold to work with. 

4 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

I think it's good to try and discuss the impacts....so I don't mind these discussions. I've seen a lot of over-attribution in the last 15 years to specific patterns that then change and we stop hearing about them for a while and we move onto the next attribution study. CC is related to all this in some form, but untangling it from natural variation is hard when it comes to specific pattern regimes....and this is doubly true when we are discussing 8 year chunks. That's a terribly small sample to make a lot of longer term conclusions from.

We know what the longer term trend is, but trying to "Adjust" our projections of temperature changes or pattern changes based on very short timescales has it's major drawbacks.

 

I know the longterm trend for ORH temperatures in DJFM is 0.4F per decade....but if we use only the trend since 2008, then it's at 2F (!!) per decade. So that's the end of the debate, right? We can assume it's going to be 2F per decade over the next 20 years or so? Nope, if we did the exact same exercise from 1985-2000, the trend was also 2F per decade....but then the next 15 years was actually a negative trend of -1.1F per decade. In the mean, the positive trends will outweigh the negative trends, but from an empirical standpoint, there is no evidence that they just continue unabated. I'm certainly open to some "tipping point" that has permanently given us a Philadelphia winter climate, but I would obviously treat such claims with extreme skepticism and they should be until evidence is way stronger.

Fair points all around

21 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

I was about to analyze the polar domain, but you saved me the trouble. Again, not arguing identical patterns would be warmer now, nor that those would have some impact on the H5 pattern, but that was not the primary issue last year. Did it cost us a few to perhaps several inches in a season with a real dearth of well-timed polar airmasses in the source region of se Canada? Probably.

The polar domain having higher heights means less cold is able to stay up north and be produced versus 1955/56 so in that sense cold air would have spilled through much of the lower latitudes you can see the difference in the amount of cold air. Think this really could have played a major role as there was no issue with precip across the area and many times down this way we were right on the edge of getting snow just ended up too warm. So it is very possible we could have had similar results had the overall atmosphere and polar domain not been warmer.

Again wish I had an SST reanalysis for 55/56. +WPO versus -WPO winter also played a significant role long sustained jet versus a wavier jet.

There also seems to be some counter balance situation between northern hemisphere and southern hemisphere that is interesting to note, probably on a decadal scale of sorts.

3 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

Actually not a terrible match over North America, though the PNA trough is deeper in 2022-23 and the NAO block is in a much better spot in '55-56 for northeast snow (west based near Hudson Bay and Baffin).

55/56 gave us in the mid atlantic around 28" of snow that winter 22-23 gave us 0.9" both solidly negative PDO signals and both in a moderate La Nina pattern. I unfortunately don't have SST reanalysis for 55/56.

By far the biggest difference was the Pacific 55/56 could have a similar ish look had we not had a +WPO pattern this past year. 

1 minute ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Well, you will definitely reach that threshold the lower in latitude and elevation a given locale is.

Going solely off the idea of 1955/56 being a moderate/strong La Nina and having a -PDO of near -3 to last year having a moderate La Nina and a -PDO of about -2.5

20 hours ago, so_whats_happening said:

Yea coming from an area that is highly variable in general this is the snow graph from Millersville just SW of me from 1926 to what looks like 2021 (unfortunately 2022 and 2023 not on their but 15.0" and 0.9" respectively).

Average is about 27.4" according to the month to month break down, feel this has gone up a bit from about 24-25" but would have to double check. We are not immune to really bad winters around here but the frequency of not having snow or having alot of snow has definitely changed a bit seems to be a one or the other situation around here.

So going off this we had a deeply negative PDO in the 50's

1950/51: around -2 to -3 over the summer (Neutral ENSO) ~7" of snow

1951/52: was a bit more relaxed but still averaged around -1 and dipped to -2 in winter. (El Nino) ~27" of snow

1955/56: deeply negative again (-2 to -3) at the levels experienced in 1950/51 (moderate to strong La Nina) ~28" of snow

1956/57: again around -1 to -2 (Neutral ENSO)  ~18" of snow

1958/59: neutral to +PDO (strong El Nino) ~8" of snow

1960's were full of snow except for 1967/68 that had ~18"  which was a neutral year (cool PDO didn't average much below -1, with a spike in july august to around -1.5 area)

Early 60's had a -PDO regime that relaxed through much of the mid to late 60's and we had some high snowfall years. Early 70s came back with a -PDO period as well then relaxed.

So strong Nino and +PDO don't go well around here, neutral ENSO and -PDO do not go well around here, La Nina and -PDO are ehh around here. So with the enhancement of the warmer Atlantic it probably nudged us over to lower snow totals during a -PDO/ La Nina pattern there was already a ridge pattern in the east due to the -PNA but it is now enhanced due to warmer waters off the coast creating a stronger ridge profile not necessarily a deeper -PDO profile.

PDO data: https://oceanview.pfeg.noaa.gov/erddap/tabledap/cciea_OC_PDO.htmlTable?time,PDO

I only state this as being a Mid Atlantic resident.

1 minute ago, bluewave said:

A 7° warmer Gulf Stream is probably playing  a role in tandem with more frequent and stronger MJO 4-6 activity with the record WPAC warm pool.

 

 

True, I mean the whole W Atlantic has just been insanely warm for years now. The Labrador current is non existent right now too. Wonder what it will take to flip the +AMO pattern?

7 minutes ago, Terpeast said:

Thanks. I was expecting 0.5, so tracking a bit behind

This is probably one of the larger differences we have seen in a warm phase. Definitely gives an idea of just how impactful this El Nino may end up.

Just now, bluewave said:

It used to be better especially further to the south of our area when there was more of a PV near the East Coast rather than a SE Ridge. 

Ocean temps probably helping in conjunction with the more frequent 4-6 MJO, top it off with a -PDO period and boy is it going to look rough. Hope we can get tropics to still actively take out the warmth along the east coast through the end of October maybe it gives us a fighting chance at something different.

6 minutes ago, Terpeast said:

Was there a september update of MEI? Want to see how the JA value compares with 0.3 in JJ. 

0.4 for July/ August

43 minutes ago, bluewave said:

I am trying not to envision anything like last winter. My point is that every winter since the 15-16 super El Niño reset has had some element of the WPAC warm pool La Niña flavor. So no mater what the ENSO does, we have had a record breaking 8 warmer than normal winters in a row. While I have gotten used to that, it isn’t easy going nearly snowless like last winter. So we need just enough -AO -NAO blocking on the Atlantic side and enough +PNA or -EPO blocking on the Pacific side to have one or a few KU events. Just way too many elements in the mix these days to say with confidence what version of winter is going to show up ahead of time.

There have been no winters with a moderate amount of snow at ISP on Long Island since the late 90s. Every winter since then has been all or nothing with the snowfall. Either at least one record breaking KU event and above normal snowfall or next to nothing and well below normal snowfall. The median snowfall winter which was the mainstay from the 60s to 90s has been nowhere to be found. So how you issue a snowfall forecast in the fall and know with confidence which type of season is going to show has been very tough to do. In the old days, you could go with a median snowfall forecast winter and have a reasonable  chance of being correct.

Yea coming from an area that is highly variable in general this is the snow graph from Millersville just SW of me from 1926 to what looks like 2021 (unfortunately 2022 and 2023 not on their but 15.0" and 0.9" respectively).

Average is about 27.4" according to the month to month break down, feel this has gone up a bit from about 24-25" but would have to double check. We are not immune to really bad winters around here but the frequency of not having snow or having alot of snow has definitely changed a bit seems to be a one or the other situation around here.