so_whats_happening

3 minutes ago, bluewave said:

Very weak event so far in regard to typical developing El Niño atmospheric response. 

 

 

Yea we have pulled ahead of the EPAC which is unusual in an El Nino and if Lee does its thing likely get pretty close on ACE as well which is just above normal as of now. We should not have gotten Franklin and Idalia forming where they did in an El Nino year.

7 minutes ago, George001 said:

I’d take a 2017-2018 type winter and run. It had some really mild stretches, averaged AN but overall but was very snowy winter with 2 blizzards. March 2018 was incredible. I had never seen so much snow in March like that before. There was about 30 inches of heavy wet snow (from 2 back to back storms) piled up, and the snowpack lasted nearly the entire month despite us missing out on the next couple of storms. That more than made up for the mild temps the previous month.

17-18 was a fun one got a foot and a half snowstorm on my bday in march otherwise was a rather average year. So I would take it and run lol

I mean we honestly can only go up from here with 4.5" in 21-22 and 0.9" last year (set a record for least snowiest year recorded in my area), like I said Ill take a foot of snow and run at this point the more the better!

5 minutes ago, Terpeast said:

Don't see any BN departures. That says a lot!

(selfishly, being in the mid-atlantic, I'm getting more excited about a near-normal winter which will be "frigid" compared to the last 7 years)

lol yea i mean at this point im perfectly fine with an above normal temp for DJF. Just give a foot snowstorm and call it a winter. Hitting average all accounts would be like hitting the jackpot in my eyes!

15 minutes ago, George001 said:

I just dug up the exact numbers instead of eyeballing it, and my previous post was wrong. The dynamical guidance had a mean of +1.3 for JJA, and the actual mean was +1.1. I see why you were saying I was incorrect about the dynamical guidance (since it has been too aggressive the past couple months). It appears like you already did this, but I went back to June and looked at what the JJA forecast was, and it forecasted a mean of +1.12! That’s pretty much dead on. I still think it’s interesting though that the dynamical guidance keeps upping the strength despite having been too aggressive the past couple months. 

So im not sure how it is set up within the model suite (as each one is different) but it most likely is reading off what is currently happening. So say we have quite the month of warming taking place, say .4C increase that month, the model will initialize and keep that same idea going strong. So just like the GFS and Euro over time it tends to go with climo after a certain amount of time meaning if it sees an El Nino like setup it will push it more toward a Nino base state meaning the atmosphere and ocean couple better the longer it goes out. If things were coupled rather well I would no doubt agree Super Nino is in store but we have seen it multiple times where models are just too ambitious with the pattern evolving like bringing consistent -VP further into central Pac, killing off the -PDO, increasing the +IOD, etc hence why you tend to get these high output readings. When it does start to incorporate the ebbs and flows it will ultimately lower the peak of some the higher output models while others will warm from their cooler state. Of course the erroneous model outputs always skew things too so it is very possible that some these rather extreme outputs are putting the dynamical model average a bit higher than say reality might be, just the same as statistical average may be skewed further down for the same reasons.

1 minute ago, George001 said:

I am mostly referring to the statistical guidance, there has been a large gap between the statistical and dynamical guidance and according to the latest data the OBS have been running significantly warmer than the statistical guidance mean and slightly warmer than the dynamical guidance mean. For some reason I can’t post pictures here so I’ll just post the source I used. Snowman19 was talking about how the models have been underestimating the +IOD, which could potentially enhance the development of the El Niño even without a big MJO wave. I am also skeptical of the MJO forecasts, they have been awful in the winter, changing wildly every update. We will see though. I’m mostly going by history (the history of stronger ninos developing after multi year ninos, what ninos were a similar strength to this one now and how did those develop) what the El Niño looks like right now, and the dynamical model prorjections. I am ignoring the statistical guidance because it has been underestimating the strength of the nino, shown by the IRI charts showing trendline of the the OBS over the past 22 months compared to the various dynamical  and statistical guidance. 
 

https://iri.columbia.edu/our-expertise/climate/forecasts/enso/current/?enso_tab=enso-sst_table#

Im aware of the large gap in Statistical and Dynamic. That is why I mentioned it is best to go middle ground versus one or the other. It follows the same idea of taking multiple different models for a winter storm forecast into consideration. I cannot agree though obs are warmer than dynamical mean (dynamic has been way too aggressive over the last couple of months) but can agree on things being warmer than statistical as this is to be expected.

As for the IOD that has just turned positive after months of models being too aggressive with forming the +IOD. The idea of a +IOD is push the -VP further east so the MJO can also respond further east, +IOD alone does not create WWB events but it can help in placing them into better spots when they do initiate, if they do.

Im curious why you go strictly with dynamical forecasts? Is there a particular reason behind it or it fits the call better? We also have not had a 3 year Nina event followed by a strong/super Nino. The only years the come close to multiple Nina years followed by a strong/super event have been 1972 and 2009 so we are indeed in uncharted territory. Ill agree MJO (RMM plots) are not exactly the greatest they do tend to have issues and are based on model forecasts but that is why you do not take them to heart for every forecast you try to get the general idea of what the model is trying to predict. If everything we have talked about was exact we wouldn't be having these conversations or a discussion that has been 93 pages on ENSO. lol

I will say this I get where you are coming from but without reasons of why this or that will occur it just doesn't help the cause, I personally am all about getting as much info as I can provide out and let the rest follow as it does. I just wish information was presented in the same manner from opposing viewpoints is all, I am just not a big fan of blanket statements or non supported posts is all. I hope to hear snowman chimes in on this too and it is not just you.

45 minutes ago, George001 said:

 

I’m mostly going by the history of how this El Niño has been developing more than MJO forecasts. A lot of the conventional tools (MJO wave, -PDO, etc) are supposed to be working against El Niño development, but the strengthening has been in line with the more aggressive end of the envelope despite that. The subsurface is starting to warm up rapidly, and Paul Roundy told me that all that warmth in the eastern regions is going to continue building west. He has been right about how this El Niño would develop since early spring, and I don’t see why that will stop.

The situations that spur these large warmings is indeed MJO driven so im not sure what that comment is about. If you can show me model forecasts from months ago that are indeed falling inline with current observations that would be wonderful. The subsurface warms due to these WWB/MJO movements we saw it back in February/ March, May/ June, and end of August there is nothing in the pipeline to keep driving the subsurface warming from the last WWB/MJO progression that happened so where is this continued rapid warming coming from? I do question though what happens if we have another dive in heat content after this last wave? We definitely see the stall situation we had in second half of June and July. We do not seem to be having the typical WWB region around 90E setting up this go around which helps feed the progression of an MJO wave/ WWB event with a KW in the subsurface. So again I question where is the extended warming coming from?

I personally will not delve into the whole twitter thing as that app is just a fools app, always has been. I personally like to take multiple perspectives rather than just find one thought that suits my own thoughts I mean we are already into September and by next week mid September we are nearing month, maybe month and a half until peak typically hits with again not a whole lot in the pipeline showing up. Until another MJO push/WWB event happens which again the end of the month event that was originally talked about doesn't look to happen anymore we flatline and even cool.

Edited to add 30 day total U winds with forecast and the last 90 days. I will also add these U wind forecasts are not perfect they tend to over exaggerate not only trade wind anom but the weakening of the trades (or reversal moments). So it best to take a more middle of the ground approach but but nothing again showing up where is the warming to come from?

11 minutes ago, George001 said:

On the weeklies absolutely, I actually think it’s going to end up around +2 on the weeklies. I think for the monthly average 1.9 is a bit of a stretch but not impossible. At the current rate of strengthening it would likely be 1.7-1.8 for September. 

What data shows this? There is no MJO wave happening or forecasted for the next two weeks (at the very least, end of month is looking less and less impressive as we move in time) so where exactly is this warming from?

We are seeing models struggle with what MJO will do next let alone get out of null. What makes this go back to 7/8/1 to allow for more Nino like processes to occur?

1 hour ago, bluewave said:

Wonder if it’s possible to get a peak in 3.4 during October since there can be a 1-2 month lag between 1.2 and areas further west?

Possibly but definitely feel November is now a better fit overall, for now.

Btw here are those two monthlies from TAO and the most recent (4th should update later but not much should have changed)

I do wish this showed further west and east though would like to see how the subsurface is reacting in those areas as well.

2 hours ago, bluewave said:

The 3.4 and 4 regions have been steadily rising while it looks like 1.2 has peaked. You can also see the subsurface heat spreading further west than it has been. The big question is if the lower departures in the east allow 3.4 to reach 2.0 before it levels off for a while?

Yea it looks as though 1+2 has peaked and we may be near peak of 3 the next few weeks (end of month should really let us know) should indicate whether or not this is true.

When i get a chance ill post but i have july to august monthlies for tao subsurface and you can see quite the change and septembers will be no different. Wish i had may and june but didnt even think about saving them.

36 minutes ago, WxWatcher007 said:

 

Idalia barely made a scratch unfortunately but nice to see some churning up out there. It will be fun to see how quickly that recovers coming up here. I will say I do not like the prospects of troughing being centered across the upper midwest/lakes region. Too far west to keep us from potential issues and with ridging into eastern Canada/ NW Atlantic definitely need to watch this system.

8 minutes ago, mitchnick said:

I  look at that ssta map and think that trades kicking in would do nothing but warm 3.4.

So this shows most of 3/ 3.4/ 4 eastern edge of 3 is cut off a bit on the right side as it is from 90W-150W, 3.4 is from 120W-170W, and 4 is from 150W-160E

If we had a month by month play from May to now Im sure we would see a slow progression westward of the anomalies. It unfortunately cuts off 1+2 which I get cause it changes a lot but would be nice to see and also the most western portion of the Pacific but luckily CPC sort of broad brushes those regions for us.

Trades kick in and tend to cap off waters and much of the warming but what I believe they also do is help with pushing the warmest portion further west with time. This progression is definitely interesting to watch.

On 8/29/2023 at 9:25 AM, griteater said:

Aug 22 to 27 TAO subsurface images.  Warm 'anomalies' (not means) are building west a bit at the surface, but also, the east-based warming is being reinforced at the surface and at depth...and the thermocline is flattening some with this wave moving east at depth.

Quite the change in the almost 10 day period.

27 minutes ago, bluewave said:

I guess the hope is we don’t get an early El Niño peak and a quickly fading IOD which allows maritime continent forcing back into picture in time for winter. Then we are pretty much at the mercy of whether blocking shows up or not. Not even sure how much Nino 3.4 needs to warm for a strong enough Nino response to mute the lingering Niña background state of recent years. I would be happy with a milder forcing pattern near the Dateline provided some blocking and and an active STJ. 

That would be pretty crazy if that happened. We will just have to watch how this goes in September a lot is up in the air still (unfortunately) how this all shakes out.

1 hour ago, mitchnick said:

Impending MJO has really weakened on guidance the last few days per link below on models that were really impressed like the Gfs suite and Bomm. Eps and extended Eps were never that impressed with it from the start and still aren't. 

https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/MJO/CLIVAR/clivar_wh.shtml

Yea models are having a hard time resolving MJO and amplitude. They seem to want this to move a little quicker than it actually is so we may be in transition time for seasons and the northern hemisphere to start kicking into gear?

I have not been impressed at all with any BOMM MJO forecast hard pass on any of those outputs. JMA/ GFS/ Euro have been doing fairly well the GFS definitely struggles with amplitude though.

Gotta wait until we actually see activity form to really know where the movement goes. As long as we stay in null all basins are essentially open for activity tropical wise. Let us see if we get something of low amplitude peak in 3 coming up here or just stay in null as we circle around trying to find an opening. 

42 minutes ago, bluewave said:

It’s a bit of a challenge to try and time the peak since the progression has been so different this year. So if everything about the evolution has been new, then can we rely on the timing and magnitude of the peaks of other events? It’s a good question. I guess the one constant is the westward lean to the forcing continues into September. While Dateline forcing during the winter could still be quite mild, at least we could up our chances for a better snowfall outcome than last winter. But the bar is pretty low. Just give me a decent STJ and some well timed blocks and I will tolerate a milder winter like we have had for the last 8 years.
 

The cooling that you mentioned in the WPAC may be dampening the MJO 4-5 and upping the 6-7. Even though the RMM charts are missing the magnitude of the forcing drifting toward the Dateline which the VP anomalies more clearly show.

 

Fair point but yea the bar is pretty low down this way I mean honestly if it were to happen again with no snow whatever just give me warm temps not the 36 and rain lol too dreary for me. Personally myself would be happy with a nice foot snowstorm and call it a season.

Also agree on the RMM plots they tend to miss out on what exactly the results could be was quite an uptick the last go about with a low amplitude wave shown on the plots. It very well could skip 4-5, models definitely showing that possibility so a push to low amplitude 3 and slide over to 6-7 is possible toward mid to late month period. I wonder if this would drag the last of the warmth from a solid wave what happens next is of course the big question. That look would seemingly be a fairly healthy spike and could serve as really strong wave. Of course always be taking caution for long range outlooks as this has been shown several times before and retreats west in time and weakens. Who knows maybe this time is different with the atmosphere a little more inline to Nino. 

Should be fun to watch this evolution definitely a different one from  at least a record stand point.

8 minutes ago, griteater said:

My prediction:

Oct: 1.8

Nov: 2.0

Dec: 2.0

Jan: 1.9

Max Tri-Monthly ONI: 1.97 rounded to 2.0 for NDJ

I voted for "Super (>2.0)", but that's with considering Super as "2.0 and higher" instead of "higher than 2.0" (I know, I'm not playing by the rules).  In addition, I consider an official SST Super Nino not just one tri-monthly reaching 2.0, but 3 tri-monthlies reaching 2.0 <OR> the average of the 3 highest tri-monthlies being 2.0 or greater...got this from the way Jan Null designates ENSO strength, which I like: 

Source: El Niño and La Niña Years and Intensities (ggweather.com)

"The Oceanic Niño Index (ONI) has become the de-facto standard that NOAA uses for classifying El Niño (warm) and La Niña (cool) events in the eastern tropical Pacific.  It is the running 3-month mean SST anomaly for the Niño 3.4 region (i.e., 5^oN-5^oS, 120^o-170^oW).  Events are defined as 5 consecutive overlapping 3-month periods at or above the +0.5^o anomaly for warm (El Niño) events and at or below the -0.5 anomaly for cool (La Niña) events.  The threshold is further broken down into Weak (with a 0.5 to 0.9 SST anomaly), Moderate (1.0 to 1.4), Strong (1.5 to 1.9) and Very Strong (≥ 2.0) events.  For the purpose of this report for an event to be categorized as weak, moderate, strong or very strong it must have equaled or exceeded the threshold of the highest category for at least 3 consecutive overlapping 3-month periods."

Like the way you presented the thought.

Was originally going with high end moderate 1.3-1.4 by October (spring thoughts) but barring some rather drastic shift that is realistically out of the possibilities. Moved to 1.7 with October peak but now going toward a November peak with how slow things seem to be progressing. If we are using ERSST that is, seems like CDAS is about .2C cooler while OISST is about .1C warmer than ERSST.

October: 1.6

November 1.9

December: 1.7

January: 1.6

There is the possibility of November going to 2 which would bump up the trimonthly to 1.8 averaged around OND.

On 9/1/2023 at 8:14 AM, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Its not exceedingly rare for the PDO and PNA to part ways...I actually think that they will this year.

Can definitely put this to the test coming up. Euro mid to long range is trying to throw a pretty nice +PNA. Of course leaves us in the East potentially vulnerable but that is another story.

Latest PDO values should be coming out soon but with the warm pool still ever present around Japan I doubt we see much warming of the values take hold. At the very least it is nice to see storms not going down the west coast that is a good sign!

50 minutes ago, bluewave said:

Thanks for posting. That gives us a clearer picture why the upper ocean heat anomalies have gone to around +1.2 recently. Looks like the +2 regions above 150 meters have expanded westward. Probably need to see what happens following this more Niña-like interval to know when the next warming spike at the surface occurs like we just saw. This evolution since last winter has been pretty unique. So we don’t have a collection of analogs to compare it to. The big question is what the ENSO regions need to warm to for the forcing to shift further east than we have seen? 

Of course what I find interesting is the cooling that has taken place in both surface and subsurface in the WPAC for the last 3 weeks. That last bout of warming did indeed create quite the punch while cooling things further west. May have one more solid punch before we start the slow reversal as the waters will start to have cooled too much to allow further subsurface warming no more warm pool out west means no more fueling the El Nino. May end up being a November peak instead of October as originally thought given the way the waves have been setting up.

If we do in fact have this MJO impulse come EOM to early October it would lead to warming through much of the 1st and 2nd weeks of October then we will probably have a much better gauge for what subsurface should look like and if it does actually cool down enough we have to see how we end this one most were undercut with cold anomalies and left a warm pool further west while surface cooled dramatically in the EPAC.

I honestly forget what page I had it written down but we seem to have smaller impacts in between some of the bigger waves that have come through. We seem to still be riding the 3 month big wave situation end of February to early March, end of May to early June, and now middle to end of August. This last one picked up a little quicker as we are very much out of the La Nina hangover and seemed to have sped things up a bit. Given this look I would say the next large wave impact would be actually closer to the end of October and honestly it is pure speculation at this point but so far the pattern hasn't changed all that much. Maybe a little impulse in between the bigger one toward the end of October? We seemed to have those with the past bigger warmings. Thinking of those smaller ones to help maintain the Nino temp levels and not allow too much cooling in between. 

Sorry for the long post.

Looks like CPC site finally updated after 2-3 weeks without an update.

Here is the subsurface animation

41 minutes ago, GaWx said:

The CFS ONI peak has come back way down from +2.15 just a few weeks ago to ~+1.80-1.85.

24 minutes ago, GaWx said:

NDJ

I am curious at when it peaks may be a split difference of october to december. Could see november as that is not too unusual. More so if we are to attain these higher number i would much rather like to see some continual activity in many aspects. Lets see how this month evolves definitely could lead us in the path of figuring things out again barring no major changes to overall progression. 

Im personally still leaning october maxima but we shall see how it goes. Could see an extended colling for another larger bump end of november /december to give it that bump. For late season.

5 hours ago, snowman19 said:

Around mid-month, the MJO wave moves/propagates into the Pacific and that’s when it constructively interferes with El Niño and really amplifies the warming. I think this month ends with region 3.4 at around +1.8C - +1.9C. This MJO looks to have good strength too

As i mentioned earlier it looks to come in the latter part of the month which will start to give impacts as we close out the month. So the best bet for it is to maintain everything status quo until then. Again assuming the wave holds properly and moves into the pacific. Forecasts were too quick in bringing this into phase 3/4 as has been the case for most of the summer so far.

Remember MJO progresses 30-45 days. It isnt perfect as sometimes it is quicker and sometimes it lags but we are still dealing with a really warm equatorial ocean so it is having a hard time creating a solid wave rather it just is spikes that seem to happen.

3 minutes ago, snowman19 said:

Yes, -PMM. IMO the -PMM is what is helping to keep reinforcing the east-based Nino warming in regions 1+2 and 3. It’s starting to expand west from there into region 3.4 now, as Paul Roundy has been hinting out for months with his paper in Pre-1980 El Niños. This Nino is behaving like the El Niños from that era.., 

maybe it got lost in translation but can you post this paper?

3 hours ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Snowman, all joking aside, I bet anything that if you start presenting some data in support of perspectives that differ from that of your own, then people will give you a lot less shit. You gain credibility and are viewed as objective, unbiased and less inflammatory. It goes both ways...we have posters that only post info in support of snow and cold and they get buns tossed at them.

There is plenty of data in support of a mild winter, but its important to look for "what could go wrong" to keep yourself honest/objective and your work exhaustive. But you def. know your stuff.

More so also posting his/her own opinions and graphics to back it up would be great. I get trying to have confirmation from the twitter crowd but it really seems like he/she wants those individuals to speak for their thoughts rather then presenting their own ideas. That is not scientific in anyway and definitely lose respect from scientists in that manner, whether right or wrong.

Honestly im not sure why everyone cares to be so right over something like this. Would much rather just chat about it and discuss how the evolution is rather funky. Throw around ideas to get a better understanding and leave it at that. Really weird to see people treating this like a job on what is supposed to be a chat forum. Can we not just take a breather from work stuff and enjoy a place where we all like to watch and talk weather?

Anyway rant over im sure nothing will change in any aspect so...

7 minutes ago, CoastalWx said:

IR and radar presentation would seem to argue it’s peaked or close to it. Eastern eyewall looks a little ragged. Western eyewall is a beast.

Yea we blipped to cat 4 so everyone can say it went cat 4 instead of high end 3. Probably has about 2 hours till landfall probably will just maintain status quo at this point.

3 hours ago, Terpeast said:

When I look at the sst map, the entire pac is warm. Even off the west coast. While the -pdo was real this past winter and spring, I’m wondering if neg values in the index today are just an artifact since the west coast waters have warmed up. The map looks more neutral to me, but warm everywhere. 

This is due to the excessively warm waters around the area of Japan and extending east. These have yet to cool otherwise we would be in a much closer neutral PDO look. As long as we don't keep re enforcing the ridge pattern out there it should slowly decline in time.