raindancewx

The SOI popped to +35.9 in the most recent reading, and it looks very strongly positive to me over the next week to ten days. Here is a look at what that does to April historically - its a strong warm signal for TX, a strong cold signal for the coastal NW, and a strong wet signal for the western Dakotas, but a strong dry signal for the NM/TX/MX border areas, and the Virginia mountains. SOI is currently +8.41 for March 1-17 (it was -7.7 in February)

For the first 1/5 of 2018, ABQ is running 1.6F colder than last year, with the lows in running almost 3F colder. March looks like it has a real chance of finishing 3-8F colder than last year here. High from 3/9 to 3/15 this year is 11F colder than last year. The 3/9-3/22 period had an average high of 76.5F in 2017, won't be anywhere near that in 2018.

Its been years since we've gone so deep into the year without a 70F reading here, only recent year to make it longer is 2010, when it took until 3/29. Our first, official 70F day is probably 3/22 or later. May finish March without hitting 75F...it hit 75F last year on February 10th. First 75F reading is usually around 3/26, so its not unusual that we haven't hit that level yet, but it doesn't look like it will happen in the next week either. The blend of 1st 75F reading as a date and February SOI reading is a strong indicator for the average March high, so will be interesting to see when we do hit 75F, if it is in April or March.

Giant line of precipitation formed...north, south, and west of me. Really hope we get something with this system. Haven't had a wet March in the city since 2007.

Fairly happy with how my winter outlook turned out for this region of the US, and really most of the US besides the interior West - for anyone who read it in mid-October.

Record dry soundings here today (dewpoint: -15F right now at 8:40 pm, 43F air temp). I'm rooting for the low tomorrow morning to get to 22F. That would be the coldest March reading in the city since 2008. If we get to 16F, that's the coldest March reading in the city since 2002. The 1931-2017 record for March is +8F. If we had snow on the ground with this airmass I think we've have a shot at it, but without the snow, can't see it dropping below 15F in any scenario. I'd assuming 19F, +/-4F.

Models can't seem to decide if the MJO keeps going (BOM), reverses back into phase two (Euro), or just dies. Consensus might be slow movement in/around phase 2/3 for another 3-5 days? The Euro has something like the light-blue line, BOM the red line. Given how cold it was today (28F low, 50F high) here wouldn't be surprised if it was back into phase 2 already.

We have yet to hit 70F down here, and are now up to 73 frosts through 3/2 (probably won't get one today). It was 75F on 2/10 and then 70F on 2/11 last year, so this is more typical, with the first 70F reading of the year usually around 3/8.

The European has been trying to go to what my analogs had for March: a wet period mid-month, sandwiched between two dry periods (3/1-3/6 and 3/21-3/31). Theoretically, it should also be a lot colder than last March, as Nino 1.2 is colder than last year, and there is some blocking, with we've seen drier nights year/year each month since December. Feb SOI is a good indicator on highs in March, as is first 70F day. If/when we get decent precip in March...I think we're done for significant precipitation down here until June, when the data suggests the monsoon develops early and fierce.

Amarillo has had exactly 0.01 inches of rain for the Oct 14-March 2 period. It seems like SOME kind of pattern is WAY overdue that can bring that area some precipitation. I'm not sure i believe an area of the US outside maybe Yuma is capable of getting that little rain for much more than a six month period.

Maybe this event gets eaten away from the East? I'd assumed the warmth would come to Nino 1.2 last, but its probably going to be warmer than average in March after the cold February. Nino 1.2 was 23.32C in January (-0.9C v. 1951-2000), probably ~25.10C (-0.6C v. 1951-2000) in February, but the trend is up, and fast, so maybe 26.5C in March (+0.4C v. 1951-2000)?

Can't wait to see what the Canadian has for March on 2/28. The CFS seems to be trying really hard to combine low-solar La Nina conditions with the big -SOI drop (low-solar El Nino). I made this after last March for future reference -

The MJO forecast site hasn't updated but BOM data is through 2/20 now, and it looks like the European forecast on 2/19 underestimated the magnitude of the MJO against. It was still in phase 8 on 2/20. 

Also, the big SOI reversal has started, BOM had a +14.65 reading for 2/22. The Feb 1-22 value is now up to -14.5. The monthly value will be anywhere from -8 to -16 if values were to be in the -16 to +16 range for the rest of the month. I do think the next six days are mostly positive, so I think the real value is probably (~90%) -8 to -12 at this point, outside chance of -7 or -13, if you get one or two incredible high/low reading in the next six, say a +35 or a random -10 to offset the mostly positive look. If we end up with only slightly positive values, <1.4, this is a 20-point drop from January, something that has happened only 14-times since 1931.

The CFS still has a cold West, warm NE kind of look for March. I think its struggling with the SOI crash (still -15.9 Feb 1-21) with the La Nina base state. But, I was able to roughly re-produce what it shows, with the caveat that it is no where near low enough on the SOI in the blend. I'm sure it will change its mind too. It had Albuquerque +9F for February on 1/31, which looks pretty bad now, we'll probably be +3F to +5F, a lot closer to the Canadian's +6F for February.

It hasn't rained meaningfully in Amarillo in like four+ months now, so that seems like a good idea for an area of heat/dryness if the ridge over the SE this month goes West.

After scoring local conditions for DJF (estimating Feb), looking at Feb Nino 1.2, Feb Nino 3.4, Solar Conditions, and converting the extended SST data in Nino 1.2 & Nino 3.4 that goes back to 1870 to ERSST V.5 temperatures for 1931-1949, incorporating the ongoing February SOI crash, the MJO, and years after major hurricanes hit TX...I ended up with this -

This is probably a better blend overall than above, as its close on local conditions too, and solar conditions, since 1933-34, and 1980-81 are included. Four years when TX was hit by a major hurricane show up among the top-20 matches to this winter here (roughly double the frequency of the poorer analogs). DJF just means its February 1934 conditions, but the winter started in 1933, and the major hurricane was in 1933. DJF? is my assessment of whether the winter highs/precip matched 2017-18 well overall. 1933-34 is overall, the second best match since 1931-32. I generally lower/raise March precipitation estimates for ABQ by solar activity, since every 100-sunspots here accounts for about 0.11" in March. I did that here too (under March column), but since my SOI blend isn't nearly low enough, it offsets the solar loss and then some. 

MJO entered phase 8 on 2/19. The big key for March is whether it returns to meaningless amplitude today (2/20), or if it transitions to phase one today at increasing amplitude. The European has entry to phase 2 on 2/23, before the wave finally dies on 2/28. I'm hoping it slows down at high amplitude one more time. NM snow pack has slowly recovered, but still well below average. The very cold temperatures today do help for sure (39F at 3 pm).

The February SOI crash remains massive: Feb 1-20 is at -16.5. For the life of me, its nearly impossible to come up with February Nino 1.2 & Nino 3.4 readings as cold as February 2018 will be, that have a big negative SOI crash. Joe Bastardi likes February 1962, but the SOI & Nino 1.2, Nino 3.4 regions are all going to be lower values than 1962. The blends I can come up with that are relatively close on all three indexes all show relatively opposite patterns to what the CFS has, although it is backing off on heat in the West. Something like this is the simplest blend I could think of that's close on the SOI, Nino 1.2, Nino 3.4 readings I expect February 2018. Big -SOI readings in February do tend to warm up the NW/N. Plains in March, so the blend has most of the West warm, not cold, like the CFS shows.

DJF      FSOI    F 1.2     F 3.4
1970     15.5    24.42    25.18
1980     -4.2    24.93     26.11
1985    -12.1    26.00    26.05
2004    -29.5    25.16    27.11
Mean   -7.58    25.13    26.11
2017    -11.00   25.10   25.90

Congratulations to the Northeast! Philadelphia is in the 70s today. Yet to happen here.

Rained in Amarillo!

This event ended up delivering largely as I'd hoped, the snow pack numbers improved for all areas of NM compared to yesterday. The city got 0.44", which brings us to 0.47" for the winter. Easily our biggest precipitation event since October. Even Sandia Peak, right next to the city got 8 inches from the event, as it was <50F when most of the precipitation fell in Albuquerque. They have a 20 inch base now.

The Amarillo dry streak is still ongoing from Oct 13 I believe. No rain. No snow.

Where I am, it looks like we've had maybe 0.03" to 0.05" with the rains today, but the dew points were 14-16 until around 5 pm, and only have reached the 30s/40s in the last 90 minutes or so. So no official accumulation at the airport....just trace (Edit: Now 0.01" as of 7:50 pm)

Phoenix, Flagstaff, and Tuscon all got some real measurable precipitation out of this event. Flagstaff has corrected up a fair bit toward normal snow since mid-January, looks like they are at 15 inches of snow for the season now (they were at 0 through mid-January)

On 2/3/2018 at 10:29 PM, raindancewx said:

Looking back at last year, we did pretty well for snow once the MJO reached the phase 2/3 transition around 2/28. For the high amplitude portion of the ongoing MJO wave, the cycles have been +49 to +55 days for phases 3,4,5,6,7 repeating, with a tendency toward the longer part of the cycle lately. Last year the MJO wave got to phase 2 on 1/21 and then 2/20 (+30 days), and then entered phase 3 on 1/26 before returning 2/28 (+33 days).

Given the +55 days cycle lately, the MJO should reach phase 8 around February 14th, sooner if the Euro is wrong about the slight retrogression towards phase 6 for a day or two. Phase one is then around Feb 22nd. Phase one is our strongest wet phase in February.

We entered phase three with current wave on 11/26 and then 1/14, so unless the wave dies or increases massively, its probably week one or week two of March.

Phase 3 Entrance: Nov 26/Jan 14 (+49)
Phase 4 Entrance: Nov 29/Jan 17 (+49)
Phase 5 Entrance: Dec 1 /Jan 22 (+52)
Phase 6 Entrance: Dec 5 /Jan 27 (+53)
Phase 7 Entrance: Dec 8 /Feb 1  (+55)
Phase 8 Entrance: Dec 20/ Feb 14 (+/-2 days?)  Euro has 2/15 but its been underestimating the MJO amplitude for the last week.

Real question at this point is when the wave dies. If it returns to the warm phases coherently in late March, the East will roast again.

 

The European for the first time has the MJO wave reaching Phase 2 around Feb 20, after entering Phase 1 around Feb 17. It seems to be slowly backing off the idea of massive retrogression towards phase 6 before the wave loses amplitude in 8-1-2. I drew in red what I think will happen given that the Euro keeps forecasting the end of the MJO wave too quickly -

Next two-three days are really key for timing the wave, we'll know if its going to retrograde or not. The retrogrades its seen so far have ended up just being slower movement towards phase 8.

Ridiculous warmth for February on the European to near average for March?

Wetter too.

The March look for temperature anomalies is pretty close to what I put in my Spring Outlook (https://t.co/85VPbQq1bD), although the European is using a more modern average, so my anomalies are higher.

For the setup next week, I do think its real. The February SOI peaks is a very strong precipitation indicator in February/March out here, and its still -19 or -20 for February through the 10th. For 1932-2017, I know the odds of staying under 0.11 inches of precipitation in Albuquerque for five months in a row are long - like 300:1 long. Since we haven't had anything over 0.10" yet...for Oct, Nov, Dec, Jan, you gotta figure its coming soon. We've never gone over six months in a row where each month is <0.11". 

https://t.co/85VPbQq1bD

I put out a Spring Outlook if anyone is curious. It incorporates a wide variety of initial conditions for NDJ, including local precipitation, high temperatures, solar and oceanic conditions, and the MJO. Focus is on NM, but I have national maps with expected threats by month. General idea is its pretty warm nationally in Spring, but the West does get wetter relative to winter.

This is mostly from the subtropical jet if it verifies, so would be rain in most areas. But...its a start. Would be snow in the mountains of the North. I think the window for precipitation will remain open into March for us, before shutting abruptly again in April, but whether its February or March that is super wet remains to be seen. I looked for ABQ specifically the other day, the SOI drops in February are actually correlated more to temperatures than precipitation, so the crash may be a better pattern for the statewide precipitation than locally. Low SOI readings have correlations to February / March precipitation approaching 0.7 over a 60-year period in the SW...so I kind of believe it at this point. The Euro solution is only seven days out. The January SST configuration looks like some wet March years here, and what I expect for February is kind of a blend of 1968, 1975, 1981, 1985 at this point. There is no January since 1981 with a January as cold as 2018 in Nino 1.2, so I'm kind of relying on some older years. Worth noting that Jan 1968 & 1981 were both after major-hurricane landfalls in Texas.

Based on frequency of very high SOI values in February, and the already-in crash for Feb 1-5 (-20.3 !!), odds of the SOI crashing negative this month are up to 66% or so. For the SOI to reach 0 for February given the SOI to date, you need the SOI to be +4.4 or higher the rest of the month, which isn't super common.

So, a crash of 9 or more from January is favored 2:1 right now. Its starting to look like we enter a somewhat stormy period, which makes sense. SOI crashes in February favor storminess at up to 0.7 correlations in the SW - although not sure if NOAA is using r-squared or just r.

Looking back at last year, we did pretty well for snow once the MJO reached the phase 2/3 transition around 2/28. For the high amplitude portion of the ongoing MJO wave, the cycles have been +49 to +55 days for phases 3,4,5,6,7 repeating, with a tendency toward the longer part of the cycle lately. Last year the MJO wave got to phase 2 on 1/21 and then 2/20 (+30 days), and then entered phase 3 on 1/26 before returning 2/28 (+33 days).

Given the +55 days cycle lately, the MJO should reach phase 8 around February 14th, sooner if the Euro is wrong about the slight retrogression towards phase 6 for a day or two. Phase one is then around Feb 22nd. Phase one is our strongest wet phase in February.

We entered phase three with current wave on 11/26 and then 1/14, so unless the wave dies or increases massively, its probably week one or week two of March.

Phase 3 Entrance: Nov 26/Jan 14 (+49)
Phase 4 Entrance: Nov 29/Jan 17 (+49)
Phase 5 Entrance: Dec 1 /Jan 22 (+52)
Phase 6 Entrance: Dec 5 /Jan 27 (+53)
Phase 7 Entrance: Dec 8 /Feb 1  (+55)
Phase 8 Entrance: Dec 20/ Feb 14 (+/-2 days?)  Euro has 2/15 but its been underestimating the MJO amplitude for the last week.

Real question at this point is when the wave dies. If it returns to the warm phases coherently in late March, the East will roast again.

Looking back at the Dec-Jan in the US since 1930 after a major hurricane hit Texas, would say 1980-81 is the closest. That year was a hot winter here, then it was wet in March.

Dec-Jan 1932, 1941, 1988, 1961, 1967 are all too cold in the West, off in the East too after a major hurricane hit Texas. 1957/1933/1999 are generally too warm everywhere after a major hurricane hits TX. 1942/1970 have other issues. 1983 is too cold everywhere. That leaves 1980-81, which is like an over-amplified version of this year. The 1980-81 Dec-Jan period had a warm Northern plains, warm West, cold East Coast, cold S. TX, cold South. That's the correct pattern.

It doesn't work at all for SSTs in the tropics, but 1980 (x3), 1983 (x2), 1999 (x1), 2002 (x2), 2014 (x1), 2016 (x1) produces the right kind of look for Dec-Jan nationally.

A look that is correct for SSTs and Dec-Jan would be 1944 (x1), 1977 (x1), 1980 (x2), 1983 (x3), 1999 (x1), 2002 (x3), 2005 (x4), 2010 (x2). Not many areas of the US more than 3F below 1951-2010 average for high temperatures. The blend of the two maps would be around an ~85% match nationally I think.

The Canadian has the mother of all Western torches for February, particularly for Arizona and parts of Texas. I don't think the magnitude is right, but that's not too dissimilar spatially from what I expect for February. I'd be +6F on the map below, v. the +9F the CFS has.

Somewhat cold winter for the East so far against 1981-2010, but S. TX is the current winner by anomalies. My outlook was against 1951-2010 mean highs, which are somewhat colder, so I think a lot of areas in the NE will actually w/in 1F against 1951-2010 highs for Dec-Jan. Had the Dakotas warm. Misses are the dryness in the Midwest and the heat in the West so far. I think against 1951-2010, the departures look something like this -