raindancewx

The AO and NAO are negative and the north is warm for the US, with Russia very cold, similar at times to 1997-98. The AO in particular was probably something like -2 or -3 on the index in January 1998. I don't know what the obsession is with the Arctic when we're in a pattern where clearly other factors are more dominant for our continent. 10 days ago you were all in a circle jerk about how we'd have the greatest SSW in history by now. We're in a pattern where there is plenty of Arctic influence...it's just been in Asia. My point is always that getting the Arctic setup right doesn't even matter in a lot of winters. Knowing that cold air will dump from the North Pole doesn't mean you know it will dump in the US, or for how long if it does.

This is a strange post, and an example of why I said you're all in denial. Isn't that pattern a decent match to the temp profile we've had this month? It's not like it's warming up anytime soon here. We have multiple days with lows in the teens coming and highs in the 30s/40s, with clouds and snow. I was ice skating on the Rio Grande at 2 pm in the afternoon today. It didn't really get above freezing for more than five minutes. Minneapolis has never finished a DJF more than +7 from what I can see, so that +15 for DJF to date is going to regress back to the mean, but not it's like the five weeks of +15 is just going to vanish overnight either. I'm always amused that you guys seem to think I went cold in the Southwest. I thought small pockets of the SE US and SW US could be a bit colder than 1F below long-term averages. I don't think any of you actually read what I write. I always come up with a composite in analogs and then exaggerate the warmth/cold to account for my instincts and observations. Last year I had the West cold, which was right. This year, I have the South generally +1 to -1, with the north warmer. I had MN to New England +3 on the low end, up to +5 if you take the blend of the raw analogs and the one anti-log. That looks fine for most of you given how warm December was, and how January has started.

I do like to use analogs to verify weather. 1951-52 was one of my two main analogs. It's an East look to an El Nino with a -PDO and it had plenty of snow for you in this time frame. See how the southern part of your area got hosed, just like this week?

Who the fuck is tacoman? I don't live on these forums as a dimwitted foot soldier in the army of progressive cripples like you do.

The city itself has literally had 0.03" below freezing with those storm as snow. They'll still be 60-90% below average ytd.

Boston, NYC, Philly, DC all are above freezing, late at night, with a rainstorm / above freezing snowstorm with the NAO and AO negative, arguably near record lows on their indices in nearly mid-January during an El Nino. I wonder when that will sink in to everyone. Most of you seem to be in the "denial" stage of grief still.

Generally, you just change the signal you want historical info in this link to get monthly data. https://psl.noaa.gov/data/correlation/wp.data Here is December. The +WPO is a pretty big warm Plains signal without much of a corresponding cold signal in the US until roughly Feb-Apr when it's a pretty strong cold/storm signal in the SW. When it warms up the Plains it often bleeds into the East as kind of "sneaky" warmth, i.e. Boston seeing it's third warmest December since 1872 this year. It's generally (not always) very hard for the East Coast to get major cold systems moving up the favored Nor'easter track through the 40-70 benchmark with those heights by Japan. Usually if Japan is snowy with storms paralleling the coast to the east, the US east coast follows. Japan tends to do better for snow in weaker El Ninos, with less snow in the stronger events. Any of that sound familiar? I mentioned recently that I expected the MJO to get back to 4-5-6 by 1/20 - the models do show that now. The MJO has been interesting this year, the rotation is more like 30 days than 45. Not something that's real common in the MJO data back to the 70s.

WPO finished at the highest value on the index in several decades for December, just above December 2006. Dec 1982 had an extremely +WPO look as well, that's one of the reasons I liked it as a main analog. Cold dump on the models is in the right place at the right time based on the lag from an intense +WPO tendency. The high value of the WPO juices up the correlation essentially.

Actually think for you guys the main issue is the West Pacific. Those +WPO setups (Kamchatka lows north of subtropics highs by the date line) at high amplitude completely nullify the -NAO/-AO periods in a lot of years. It's not like we've had only +NAO periods in the Jan 15-Apr 15 period when the NAO is strongest as a signal in recent years. The SE tends to warm up when the WPO goes positive. It's part of why you get what Chuck talks about, the -PNA with -NAO thing. WPO goes negative way less than it used to, and does seem tied to the warming by Indonesia and the Indian Ocean.

Happy January 5th everybody. Snow continued most of the night in ABQ yesterday, so we're at 3.2" now since 10/1. If you use 1.2-5.2" as bounds for Jan 5 in an El Nino, we're on target for 10.8" now, up from 8 when I used 0-2" through Dec. I included near El Ninos 1979-80 and 2003-04 to dull the total a bit too. Almost every year on the list below has major SW US snows in March or April btw. If we make it to January 10th in an El Nino without an inch of snow in the NE cities (very unlikely now for Boston), the totals really start to deteriorate. Boston: <=1" by Jan 10, El Nino -------------------------------- 2006-07: 17.1 (Oct-May) 2015-16: 36.1 2018-19: 27.4 ------------- Blend: 26.9 NYC: <=1" by Jan 10, El Nino --------------------------------- 1965-66: 21.4 (Oct-May) 1972-73: 22.9 1991-92: 12.6 1994-95: 11.8 1997-98: 5.5 2006-07: 12.4 2015-16: 32.8 -------------- Blend: 17.1" PHI: <=1" by Jan 10, El Nino ------------------------------ 1958-59: 5.1 (Oct-May) 1965-66: 27.4 1972-73: 0.0 1991-92: 4.7 1994-95: 9.8 1997-98: 0.8 2004-05: 30.4 2006-07: 13.4 2015-16: 27.5 2019-20: 0.3 -------------- Blend: 11.9"

Nice snowy day today for me. Over an inch of snow at the airport officially. At the end of the day, the East based El Ninos and Modoki La Ninas are often pretty similar weather even though the traffic pattern in the Pacific is completely different. The premise of my forecast was you'd see alternating cold pockets/periods in the South and West throughout the winter. West from the -PDO, South from the El Nino. A normal El Nino would see alternating cold pockets East and South.. I'll repeat what I said the other day though - we're getting very close to the part of the pattern that can produce a fluky heavy snow event in the deep south.

Canadian look for January is in finally. It has weakened the transition of the El Nino to the West, and has a much weaker, but east based look throughout Jan-Mar. By Apr-May, we are rapidly transitioning into an east based La Nina. I suspect the Spring will be a bit like 2005, but it's early. The models have been forecasting to much warmth with this event for months, even at short ranges. So I think a faster collapse of the El Nino is possible. No reason to think we verify on the warm side of the Euro plume.

A lot of disputed MJO movement on the models at the moment. I expect to see phase 4-6 again by Jan 20 or so. We'll see. Wave may die or have competing centers of influence before it gets there though. CPC still looks on board with my outlook for January. I found 1993-94 was a pretty strong match to opposite conditions of this year when I did my outlook, so it makes sense to see the weird storm patterns and ongoing persisting heat to me up there. In the short term January 1973 has shown up on some of these CPC looks for the 6-10 and 8-14 ideas. I suspect we're actually getting very close to the part of the pattern that will support a huge, fluky snowstorm in the South ala 1973. I've been expecting that in the 1/15-2/15 time frame, if it is to happen.

I'd really like to see what the Canadian has for January. No update yet on Tropical Tidbits. Oh well.

Subsurface heat for 100-180W continues to rapidly thin. It often peaks in November. Some examples of big Nov-Dec drop offs. https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/ocean/index/heat_content_index.txt Year Oct Nov Dec 2023 1.13 1.45 1.11 2018 1.47 1.25 0.92 2015 1.91 1.78 1.20 2009 1.04 1.75 1.36 1997 2.56 2.30 1.02 1994 1.12 1.16 0.80 A decent blend to match Oct-Dec is: 1994 1.12 1.16 0.80 2009 1.04 1.75 1.36 Blend 1.08 1.46 1.08 2023 1.13 1.45 1.11 Here is how Dec 2023 finished btw. Generally above +3 above average north of I-40.

In El Nino / La Nina with opposite phase PDO I find it's more of indicator of EPO/WPO stuff than the PNA. I never really expected the PNA to be negative. Still an El Nino at the end of the day. PNA has always been kind of over rated to me as an indicator of anything anyway. Look at the last week with the most strongly +PNA values/setup of the month - that's the look I kept getting blending strong El Nino with -PDO. By the way, that Kamchatka low on 12/18 does look like it is going to come through the SW US on Jan 5 or so, which is in the 1/3-1/7 period I identified back then. We'll see how it goes, still a way out.

I actually think January should be a relaxed continuation of December. Still warm in the North, cooler South, but not 15F above average anywhere. There should be actual honest to goodness cold somewhere in the South in January. I think you'll see some northward expansion of the southern cold at times into both the East and West, with alternating troughs. What CPC has for early January is pretty close to my outlook for January from October. Didn't really have a warm month. The CFS frames for Dec 26-28 look too warm to me for January.

One of my pet theories from the volcano is that a lot of would be snow events became rain or mix events because the marginal boundary level stuff that would work in a lot of barely cold enough storms now has too much moisture/heat from the higher dew points globally. A lot of Nor'easters have some kind of warm nose, or warm mid-layer boundary that prevents an event from staying all snow or even all sleet/snow. I think that's part of what happened in 1994-95, which was after Pinatubo, but during a period when all the aerosol material had fallen out of the sky, while the heat enhancing crap remained. I'm sure there will be plenty of pretty good storm tracks later in the year, with setups that would have 32F ish temps at the surface, but I'm not sure they'll work this year.

I believe this will be the warmest December on record for the lower 48. Most of the northern lower 48 will finish +3 to +15. It's probably something like +8F for the northern states, and +3F for the southern US. Locally we've had some slightly cold days recently. We'll probably finish Dec between +2 and +3. I put the +/-0F line for seasonal anomalies in my winter outlook half way into the yellow areas of the SE and SW US, so that still looks on target. I thought the rest of the country would be quite warm. Warm El Nino months in the Southwest are largely a reflection of diminished diurnal ranges from higher dew points. We've not dropped below 20 yet - which is fairly unusual here. But every winter on record has fallen to at least 19. I'm sure we'll get there at least once. The highlands of Mexico have seen the traditional east based El Nino effects in some respects, despite also matching the -PDO look I showed before. The central highlands as far south as 20N have had highs in the mid-50s this month with rainy days, despite being at relatively low altitudes, like 6,000 feet. During the drier periods when the subtropical jet has shifted north, they have some lows in the 30s as well.

The tendency for the more recent Strat Warm events to not be cold in the East is why I've not been super into following it. We more or less "know" where it is going to dump cold right? I mean Minneapolis has never had a winter average above like 27F since like the 1930s. It's 35F there in December month to date, and they average about 20F for the winter. Seems like the obvious spot for SSW cold to dump is...the Plains. Again. Since any dump will come during a period when the El Nino is rapidly weakening, I'd expect some SE ridging in response like in prior years. This is all assuming of course that the cold even comes to the US. But I doubt Minneapolis will finish +15F if the record is +7F for their warmest winter in 90+ years.

Boston should literally be at a foot of snow or so through 1/5. Instead you have less than an inch, with none in the forecast. To get to average, you'd need a +30% period of above average snow, which is a huge reversal from a 90%+ deficit, and that +30% reversal would need to last for 3 months from several small storms in an extended cold period. Otherwise it needs to come from a couple big storms. The issue with the latter is that you can see from the NYC/Philly totals that the bigger storms tend to not come when those cities are heading into week two of January without any snow. I'm also not super sold on the strat warming thing. A lot of those years come when the entirety of the coldest Northern Hemisphere climates are super warm in early winter. You don't really have that - it's been very cold in Russia and China this month. The Arctic Oscillation is already negative, and the NAO will be too by the end of the year, and you guys still don't look particularly cold in the short term.

I think the main issue with this event is that the most typical El Nino conditions happen in rapid periods of subsurface warming. We had that...in March. Remember when California got nuked with snow and people died? Haven't had any rapid warming in the subsurface since. The warmth itself doesn't really do anything. We're the most sensitive part of the US to El Nino here, and we've always responded better to the "warming" of the ocean than the "warmth" of the ocean if that makes any sense. The subsurface hasn't really warmed much at all since Spring.

Here is a look at total snow for Boston, NYC, Philly in El Nino if we make it to Jan 5, 2024 without an inch. Once you get to January without an inch of snow in NYC/Philly, odds of a rebound start to deteriorate very quickly. Boston has a bit more time, but the general rule applies. Years with <=1" snow through Dec are essentially running 70%+ below average through a large portion of the cold season by time (Dec is a low snow month, but still 1/4 of the main Dec-Mar window in the NE coastal cities). It's not super common to rebound from a -70% pattern for snow to a long duration period of above average snow that can offset it. El Nino is a better snow signal further south, so there is more volatility in the rebound towards averages for DC/Philly than NYC/Boston in the rebounds. Anyway, still no snow on the models for the cities through Jan 5. I did have 1972, 1991, 1997 as analogs, so this all makes sense to me. Boston, <=1.0", El Nino, Oct-Jan 5 1957-58 - 44.7 2006-07 - 17.1 2015-16 - 32.6 2018-19 - 27.4 Blend: 30.5" NYC, <=1.0", El Nino, Oct-Jan 5 1965-66 - 21.4 1972-73 - 2.8 1991-92 - 12.6 1994-95 - 11.8 1997-98 - 5.5 2006-07 - 12.4 2015-16 - 32.8 Blend: 14.2" Philly, <=1.0", El Nino, Oct-Jan 5 1958-59 - 5.1 1965-66 - 27.4 1972-73 - 0.0 1991-92 - 4.7 1994-95 - 9.8 1997-98 - 0.8 2004-05 - 30.4 2006-07 - 13.4 2014-15 - 27.0 2015-16 - 27.5 2019-20 - 0.3 Blend: 13.3"

One of the more interesting things about this event has been the conflict between the -PDO and the El Nino. In Mexico, this month, we have a dead on match to -PDO conditions. In the US, the incredible warmth in the Dakotas and MN is very much a match to stronger El Nino years, and not at all a match to the -PDO years. I said in my outlook that -PDO is a cold December signal in old Mexico, while a warm Nino 3.4 is a cold Feb signal in old Mexico. I really think they may have a much colder winter than the US relative to their local averages.

Tropical Tidbits has waters by Peru running below average now. Some cooling building West. If you remember March 2023, you had a period of rapid subsurface warming. This December is largely opposite. March was severely cold in the West and very stormy. Been warm and fairly quiet this month. Early December, when the rising heat content was rising before reversing was certainly cooler for most than the more recent days. For what it's worth, the heat content should continue to rapidly thin...and sure enough the CFS has another +15 type month for areas in the Northern Plains in January at the moment.