raindancewx

Subsurface is hanging on. Finish around +0.7 for January would be interesting for February.

My analogs had 1/20-2/10 as the coldest period in the Northeast US. The convection in the Indian Ocean now tends to precede warm ups in the US by 10-15 days according to a research paper, and it last showed up before the December warm up. The CFS has a pretty warm second week of February now, possibly in conjunction with this research. The positive SOI in December (and maybe January?) favor warmth in the SE US to some extent. For March...I could see things getting a bit crazy in the West or Plains, but I agree on a warm up for the East. The El Nino Marches following an El Nino hurricane season with a major hurricane hitting the US Gulf Coast tend to feature severe cold in the Western half of the US...somewhere. Look at March 1942, 1958, 1966, 1970, 2005. Big NAO+ periods in October correlate pretty strongly to a cold Jan/Mar in the West, regardless of ENSO, and that looks fairly solid so far. Low solar El Ninos tend to be warm in the East in March too. I have my analog set for Spring, tentatively, but can't see what they look like yet with the NOAA/ESRL stuff down. I've been pretty happy with my blend of 1953-54, 1976-77, 1986-87, 1994-95, 1994-95, 2006-07 for winter to date in the US.

I was looking at annualized sunspot activity in various US locations v. March high temperatures. Looked at Boston, Philadelphia, Jacksonville, Detroit, St. Louis, Memphis, Bismarck, Amarillo, El Paso, Albuquerque, Flagstaff, Phoenix, Cheyenne. Just about every site has weak correlations between solar activity and March highs, but the zone around Amarillo is definitely strongest. R squared for Amarillo for 1932-2018 is 0.10 - that's pretty damn strong. Every 100 sunspots lost is like 2F added to the high. The weakest correlations are in areas right on the coast, especially away from the equator. A lot of places seem to have a weak correlation just because 1958 was cold and had near record solar activity, but in Texas and the Southern Plains it works in the other high solar years too.

It was 63F today. Naturally ahead of the mother of all cold fronts, with gusts to 70 mph observed on some of the mountains. Now it is 45F, windy, and snowing west of the city where the cold has arrived already. Will be interesting to see if it tries to flurry in the city tonight. I've seen it snow here within 12 hours of hitting 75F, so it wouldn't be that surprising.

CPC has the Eastern Nino zones warmer than the Western zones this week like Tropical Tidbits. This is winter so far. Nino1+2 Nino3 Nino34 Nino4 Week SST SSTA SST SSTA SST SSTA SST SSTA 05DEC2018 23.1 0.8 26.2 1.1 27.6 1.0 29.7 1.2 12DEC2018 23.4 0.8 26.1 1.0 27.7 1.1 29.7 1.2 19DEC2018 23.7 0.7 26.2 1.0 27.6 1.0 29.5 1.0 26DEC2018 24.1 0.8 26.0 0.7 27.3 0.7 29.2 0.8 02JAN2019 23.9 0.2 26.1 0.6 27.3 0.7 29.1 0.8 09JAN2019 24.6 0.5 26.1 0.6 27.0 0.4 28.9 0.6 16JAN2019 25.4 0.9 26.3 0.6 27.1 0.5 29.0 0.7 Nino 1.2 is pretty warm so far in January. Here is a look at Nino 1.2 - Nino 3.4 for week three in January for each El Nino to get an idea on El Nino structures at this time: 1991-92: -1.7C, 1994-95: -0.2C, 1997-98: +1.3C, 2002-03: -1.5C, 2004-05: -0.2C, 2006-07: -0.2C, 2009-10: -1.3C, 2014-15: -1.0C, 2015-16: -1.1C, 2018-19: +0.4C 01JAN1992 24.0 0.3 26.7 1.3 28.5 1.9 29.3 1.0 08JAN1992 24.2 0.2 26.8 1.3 28.5 1.9 29.2 0.9 15JAN1992 24.6 0.2 26.9 1.3 28.4 1.9 29.1 0.8 04JAN1995 24.7 0.8 26.1 0.7 27.6 1.1 29.3 0.9 11JAN1995 25.1 0.9 26.2 0.7 27.6 1.0 29.2 0.9 18JAN1995 25.3 0.8 26.4 0.7 27.6 1.0 29.3 1.0 07JAN1998 28.0 4.0 28.9 3.4 29.2 2.6 29.1 0.8 14JAN1998 28.4 4.0 28.9 3.3 29.1 2.5 29.0 0.7 21JAN1998 28.4 3.7 28.9 3.2 29.0 2.4 28.9 0.7 01JAN2003 24.2 0.6 26.6 1.2 28.1 1.5 29.4 1.1 08JAN2003 23.9-0.1 26.3 0.8 27.9 1.3 29.2 0.9 15JAN2003 24.1-0.3 26.3 0.7 27.7 1.2 29.3 1.0 05JAN2005 23.7-0.2 25.7 0.3 27.1 0.5 29.3 0.9 12JAN2005 24.2 0.0 25.9 0.3 27.1 0.5 29.2 0.9 19JAN2005 25.0 0.3 26.0 0.3 27.1 0.5 29.2 0.9 03JAN2007 24.3 0.5 26.4 0.9 27.5 0.9 29.2 0.8 10JAN2007 24.9 0.7 26.7 1.1 27.5 0.9 29.1 0.8 17JAN2007 25.0 0.4 26.4 0.7 27.2 0.6 28.8 0.6 06JAN2010 24.3 0.4 26.7 1.2 28.3 1.7 29.7 1.3 13JAN2010 24.6 0.3 26.7 1.1 28.2 1.6 29.6 1.3 20JAN2010 24.7 0.1 26.5 0.8 28.0 1.4 29.5 1.2 07JAN2015 23.7-0.2 25.9 0.4 27.0 0.4 29.1 0.7 14JAN2015 24.0-0.4 25.9 0.3 27.1 0.5 29.1 0.9 21JAN2015 24.3-0.4 26.1 0.3 27.2 0.6 29.2 1.0 06JAN2016 25.7 1.8 28.1 2.7 29.1 2.6 29.7 1.4 13JAN2016 25.7 1.4 28.3 2.8 29.2 2.6 29.6 1.3 20JAN2016 26.0 1.4 28.2 2.5 29.1 2.5 29.6 1.4

Low Solar + El Nino in March is an interesting combo historically.

I found a free site that stored SST, Snow, Precip and Temperature data from ESRL before the shutdown, through 11/30/2018 if anyone wants to use it - https://www.frontierweather.com/monthlyclimatemaps.html Main limitation is it only goes back to 1950 and you can't combine years into composites. The Jamstec forecast for Spring has essentially gone from a Spring 1977 look to a Spring 2005 look. I kind of like the look of Spring 1970 actually. 2005 sort of briefly died as a La Nina in March before warming again briefly, whereas 1977 was more steady in Spring, I don't know if that is what the Jamstec is seeing. I don't think we'll go to another El Nino (I'd love to be wrong) - like 1977 after 1976 but I don't think a La Nina is imminent either. I'm still debating on weighting and inclusion but I'll probably end up blending 5-8 of these years for my Spring forecast - 1941-42, 1957-58, 1965-66, 1969-70, 1976-77, 1986-87, 1994-95, 2004-05, 2006-07, 2014-15, and then I'll throw in some combination of 1974-75, 1998-99, or 2008-09 to account for the positive SOI in December and the slow weakening of the El Nino. I actually consider 1974-75 to be a better analog than most of the El Ninos, because it was a +1.3C warm up in Nino 3.4 year/year, had low solar, and a major hurricane hit the Gulf of Mexico. You don't have many warm ups y/y of that magnitude in Nino 3.4 in the last 100 years, regardless of the ENSO state.

The good news is after the initial update had MM, Logan changed to report 0.5" yesterday, so presumably with the snow today Boston has topped an inch of snow since 10/1. The city is 4900-6300 feet, so anywhere from 2-10". Officially 5.3". I had snow on the ground at my house, from only 6.5", for 11 days in a row starting on 12/27. I'm sure we'll get more eventually, traditionally we do very well in March (sometimes Feb) if there is no calendar month in an El Nino with around 7" by the end of January, we had 3.3" in Dec, and 2.0" in Jan to date where the records are kept. The snow in Jan was particularly impressive as it was around 19F all afternoon (-28Fish) , and we had only 0.06" officially, but we have much drier snow than you guys do. Every El Nino on record, except 1953-54 has had snow here has had snow after January, so its pretty likely we'll get more. My precipitation pattern is almost a dead on match for July-Dec in El Nino years with major hurricanes hitting the Gulf, so I'm incorporating those into my Spring Outlook, and they tend to favor very snowy Marches in the Rockies & Plains. I threw in a couple La Nina years too, since the +SOI in Dec needs to be respected for what it does to US temps in Feb/Mar.

It looks like the Jamstec Model updated. It may be using ESRL data, since it doesn't include an initialized value for December like it normally would for its Jan 1 update. The update has El Nino conditions lasting until June, but that is an earlier end than before, when they lasted until Fall. The East is shown colder than the last run, with the Northern Plains & WA state warm both times, and NM/CO cold on both runs. The Western US and SE are shown wet, with areas of the Plains wet too. East trended drier. Here is a look at how well the Jan 2018 Jamstec run did for Spring 2018. It did quite well actually -

Official 1/19 snow measurement for Boston (Logan): MM, i.e. missing. I find NWS does that when snow falls, and the melted equivalent is above 0.01", but it doesn't stick. At least they do that locally. On the five minute observations it looked like some of the precip came in as freezing drizzle and above freezing snow. Logan only had 0.13" liquid equivalent of whatever fell anyway.

My hunch is this event just weakens slowly for having a relatively low peak, but we don't have another El Nino next year. My point above is that the years like 2003, 2007, 2010, 2015 (before it redeveloped later in March) all weakened very rapidly in January or February at the subsurface and then the pattern went nuts for the NE. January doesn't seem to be showing rapid weakening. February might, but Tropical Tidbits has been showing a recovery in most zones lately, after the extended -SOI burst earlier in the month (and more -SOI days look likely by 1/31 too). The event still kind of looks like an East-Central / Basin Wide hybrid, with the core of the heat near 120W, oscillating east/west of that area at times but never too far. The subsurface is still weakening I think, but its not dead yet like 2006-07 or 2002-03, or clearly moving that way like 2015-16. To me, this pattern has been driven as much by the transition from the La Nina last year as the El Nino this year. The El Ninos after La Ninas tend to be colder in the West, and that has shown up this year. The absence of a canonical positive PDO (waters by Japan still look like a -PDO, and the blob by Alaska is cooling, not warming since Fall), and the +SOI in December are all examples of things that wouldn't have been there if we had transitioned from a Neutral or Modoki La Nina into this El Nino instead of from an East-based La Nina that at times (Jan 2018) had the coldest waters by Peru in decades.

The subsurface numbers for January (300m down, 100W-180W) look like they'll come in around +0.7. A similar transition for Nov-Dec-Jan would be these years blended as a guideline for February. 100-180W Nov Dec Jan 1979 1.06 0.92 0.83 1979 1.06 0.92 0.83 1982 1.92 1.45 0.05 1991 1.22 1.71 1.57 1994 1.16 0.80 0.51 2002 1.58 0.74 0.27 2009 1.75 1.36 1.14 2014 0.90 0.54 0.15 Mean 1.33 1.06 0.67 2018 1.35 1.06 0.70 Here is a look at what those years looked like in February nationally. A lot of the the years with very cold February temps in the US are El Nino with a big collapse in the January subsurface to below El Nino thresholds (+0.5) (2002-03, 2006-07 in the Midwest, 2014-15). Slower fall offs, like this year tend to be less extreme for cold and heat. Big positive SOI Decembers (like the +9.1 in Dec 2018) tend to precede a warm February in the South, and hold down temps on the West Coast, so with the SOI blended in, I think the core of the cold in February is likely over Missouri, rather than say Ohio or New York. With the analog site down, I'm just guessing what the blend looks like, but it seems like a near normal WA/OR/SE US, cold centered in Missouri is what I like for February. Warmth is in the interior NW. It's kind of a warm West / cold East pattern turned 45 degrees to the right from the SOI if that makes any sense since the +SOI December should not impact the SW too much, but will warm up the SE and cool off the NW. Given how the years looked, and the SOI in December, Feb 1983, 1992, 2015 as a simpler blend is probably approximately right. Again, ESRL is down, can't graph these, so I am guessing on the exact look of the blends.

Blue Norther level cold front in the coming days. CPC is impressively confident in the cold, they rate this as a 4/5 confidence in the discussion. We hit 50F here today, first time since Christmas, three weeks ago. Latest in January we've had our first 50F reading since Jan 1977.

My concern initially, for say, five days, is the MJO will move through phases 4-5-6, which are warm this time of the year for the East, sometime between 1/20 and 1/25 if the European depiction is right at fairly high magnitude. I do think the real transition is starting now, my analogs had 5" in Boston through mid-January and then 30" after, so its kind of right on time, but the transition is late enough that I think most places in the East finish slightly warmer than normal for DJF overall. Also, I don't think it will last six weeks for the whole country, I think the core of it is between the Rockies and Mississippi by mid-February, but I agree with your assessment generally.

It's kind of amusing to me that Denver has been in the 60s this month, as has Boston, but Albuquerque has yet to hit 50F since 2019 started. We'll get there this week in all likelihood, certainly by the end of the month, but its already the deepest into the year without hitting 50F here since January 1977...which is one of my analogs. With the rains/snows/clouds and cold lows it just doesn't warm up easily here.

Roughly half way through Dec-Feb, the weeklies have Nino 3.4 at an average of 27.4C. Against 1951-2010, this is +0.9C or so for that period. The zones West of Nino 1.2 have cooled relatively fast to Nino 3.4 over the past six weeks, with Nino 4 in particular cooling from near record levels. You can see relative to 2014-15 in Dec-Jan, the event is much more of a basin-wide event than 2014-15 was. 2002-03 and 2009-2010 were stronger and far more centered to the West by this time. 2006-07 was stronger at this week, but collapsed very quickly after, which doesn't seem likely. Anyway, new Jamstec should be out soon, and eventually NOAA/CPC will update the monthly Nino 3.4 data. https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/data/indices/wksst8110.for Nino1+2 Nino3 Nino34 Nino4 Week SST SSTA SST SSTA SST SSTA SST SSTA 05DEC2018 23.1 0.8 26.2 1.1 27.6 1.0 29.7 1.2 12DEC2018 23.4 0.8 26.1 1.0 27.7 1.1 29.7 1.2 19DEC2018 23.7 0.7 26.2 1.0 27.6 1.0 29.5 1.0 26DEC2018 24.1 0.8 26.0 0.7 27.3 0.7 29.2 0.8 02JAN2019 23.9 0.2 26.1 0.6 27.3 0.7 29.1 0.8 09JAN2019 24.6 0.5 26.1 0.6 27.0 0.4 28.9 0.6 03DEC2014 22.3 0.0 25.8 0.7 27.4 0.8 29.4 0.9 10DEC2014 22.8 0.2 26.0 0.9 27.5 0.9 29.4 0.9 17DEC2014 22.9 0.1 26.0 0.8 27.4 0.8 29.4 1.0 24DEC2014 23.1-0.2 26.0 0.7 27.3 0.7 29.3 0.9 31DEC2014 23.6 0.0 25.9 0.6 27.1 0.5 29.2 0.8 07JAN2015 23.7-0.2 25.9 0.4 27.0 0.4 29.1 0.7 14JAN2015 24.0-0.4 25.9 0.3 27.1 0.5 29.1 0.9 09DEC2009 22.7 0.2 26.6 1.5 28.2 1.7 29.6 1.1 16DEC2009 22.6-0.2 26.7 1.5 28.3 1.8 29.7 1.2 23DEC2009 23.7 0.5 26.8 1.5 28.4 1.9 29.7 1.3 30DEC2009 24.3 0.7 26.7 1.4 28.3 1.7 29.6 1.2 06JAN2010 24.3 0.4 26.7 1.2 28.3 1.7 29.7 1.3 06DEC2006 22.9 0.5 26.1 1.1 27.9 1.3 29.6 1.1 13DEC2006 22.9 0.2 26.3 1.2 27.8 1.2 29.5 1.0 20DEC2006 23.7 0.6 26.5 1.3 27.7 1.2 29.4 1.0 27DEC2006 24.0 0.6 26.6 1.3 27.7 1.1 29.4 1.0 03JAN2007 24.3 0.5 26.4 0.9 27.5 0.9 29.2 0.8 10JAN2007 24.9 0.7 26.7 1.1 27.5 0.9 29.1 0.8

I'm expecting a fairly big system to come through the West sometime around 1/23. The big SOI drops have all showed up as storms at a lead of 10 days. The problem is they are all weak and/or moisture starved so far. This is the "SOI calendar". Date Tahiti (hPa) Darwin (hPa) Daily Contribution 30 day Av. SOI 90 day Av. SOI 13 Jan 2019 1009.64 1006.95 -9.04 2.30 2.80 12 Jan 2019 1011.02 1007.65 -5.84 3.32 3.14 11 Jan 2019 1012.30 1007.20 2.31 4.19 3.51 10 Jan 2019 1011.56 1008.50 -7.30 4.56 3.75 9 Jan 2019 1011.75 1007.65 -2.40 4.94 3.94 8 Jan 2019 1012.44 1007.80 0.15 5.05 3.98 7 Jan 2019 1012.09 1008.40 -4.33 4.93 3.97 6 Jan 2019 1010.17 1007.40 -8.66 5.15 3.97 5 Jan 2019 1008.86 1008.20 -18.60 5.64 3.97 4 Jan 2019 1009.55 1009.25 -20.30 6.46 4.11 3 Jan 2019 1009.90 1008.05 -13.00 7.42 4.31 2 Jan 2019 1009.71 1007.10 -9.42 7.94 4.48 1 Jan 2019 1009.66 1006.60 -7.30 8.53 4.66 31 Dec 2018 1010.49 1006.85 -0.42 9.23 4.67 30 Dec 2018 1010.45 1005.45 6.64 9.46 4.50 29 Dec 2018 1011.15 1004.35 15.98 9.44 4.16 28 Dec 2018 1010.84 1003.60 18.27 9.33 3.79 27 Dec 2018 1008.54 1004.50 1.66 9.23 3.48 26 Dec 2018 1008.83 1005.75 -3.32 9.37 3.39 25 Dec 2018 1009.69 1005.60 1.92 9.48 3.37 24 Dec 2018 1010.56 1005.75 5.66 9.41 3.34 23 Dec 2018 1011.65 1005.45 12.87 9.35 3.16 22 Dec 2018 1011.39 1005.10 13.34 9.15 2.81 21 Dec 2018 1011.94 1005.35 14.89 8.83 2.36 20 Dec 2018 1012.71 1007.00 10.33 8.53 1.91 19 Dec 2018 1013.25 1008.05 7.68 8.40 1.63 18 Dec 2018 1014.64 1006.70 21.90 7.89 1.49

These are the top SOI matches for July 2018 to January 2019, assuming January finishes around -8, like it is for 1/1-1/13. 1932, 1957, 1969 all had major hurricanes hit the Gulf of Mexico. Good to see things from those years showing up given what I think March may do. SOI Monthly July Aug Sept Oct Nov Dec Jan Match 2018 1.8 -6.7 -8.5 2.6 0.6 9.2 -8.0 0.00 2003 3.2 -1.2 -1.6 -2.9 -2.4 9.0 -12.8 27.30 1948 0.8 -4.0 -7.1 6.6 4.2 -6.8 -7.9 28.80 1954 3.3 9.4 2.3 2.2 2.3 11.5 -5.5 35.30 1932 1.1 4.9 -8.3 -4.1 -4.6 1.8 -11.8 35.60 1969 -6.4 -4.0 -10.0 -11.6 -0.2 2.3 -10.8 37.10 1957 1.4 -8.2 -9.4 -0.3 -11.0 -4.3 -17.5 40.30

It's still early, but I had the NE coastal plain with relatively low snow, high snow downwind of the Great Lakes in NY, and higher than normal snow in the Rockies and Plains. That seems at least broadly correct, although it has snowed more in NC/VA than I expected. The early snow SE, and ice storms in the NE more or less verified in November, as did the Plains blizzards in November. The areas of the NE I had below normal have been so far too, despite the fast start in November. It's not perfect, but for 10/6, it seems to be doing fairly well so far.

Looking like we'll get a wet snow event here Sat Night into Sun Morning (probably a 10 pm to 10 am event). The AMO seems to control heavy snow in Jan/Dec here - only one January topped 4 inches from 1946-47 to 1960-61, only one January topped 4 inches from 1997-98 to 2013-14, so if we get to 5-6" in January, most since January 1995 when the AMO flipped - might be time to start looking hard at the AMO beginning to flip phases for 20-30 years. It was certainly much snowier in January after 1960-61 when the AMO began to rapidly cool off for a while

New Euro run for Nino 3.4 has El Nino most likely to continue through May. Weak conditions are possible as late as June or July though if this run is right. Anything resembling the current run would make the strong El Ninos analogs for Spring, 2002, 2004, 2006, 2009, 2015 were all dead by May. 1982, 1986, 1997, 2014, the strongest and two-year events, not so much.

Storms seem to more commonly stay to the South when the AMO is neutral or cold, I think that's probably the major difference between 2018 and 2006 for late Dec, CPC was using 2006 in their 6-10 and 8-14 outlooks as analogs for many time frames, but CO missed out on most of it, with NM, TX and MX doing fairly well, and the AMO -0.120 or so in Nov before the shutdown took out ESRL. If you look at temps in NM, after Christmas to early January, they are very similar to 2006-07 with the snows holding down highs for a pretty long time. Even with today and yesterday in the upper 40s we're still running with a monthly high of ~40F. All that being said, if we cycle through this when temps are warmer, I could see NM & CO doing very well for cold and snow in March.

The CPC ONI stuff is up, but hasn't been updated for December yet. Our friends at BOM, against 1961-1990, had Nino 3.4 at +0.8C, which is about 27.2C as there are a lot of potent La Ninas in that period (1988, etc). They probably are using a different data set than NOAA/CPC anyway. The December look is fairly east-based on their map. http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/enso/#tabs=Sea-surface

Here is a subsurface comparison to 2006-07, 2014-15 and 2015-16 at this time. The rapid collapse in 2007 and 2016 was fairly evident by now. Lots more red...but also blue. Can't get a good animation for 2009-10 for the same time period, but the collapse began in March 2010 that year.

Given the subsurface similarities to Dec 1997 (+1.1 is actually warmer for this year than 1997 for 100-180W) I don't think its too surprising we have somewhat similar weather so far. At a seasonal level the long-term phases of the oscillations matter, but at the sub-seasonal stuff, the MJO beats everything, so 1997-98 with similar MJO progression hasn't been bad as an analog since November. Jan 1998 is almost the same magnitude MJO in phase 8 on 1/8 as today is according to the BOM site MJO archives. http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/mjo/ I'm looking very hard at the El Nino years following a major hit on the Gulf Coast for March. For whatever reason you tend to get extreme Marches after that happens. You can see it last year after Harvey as an example. The five El Nino Springs after a Gulf Coast hurricane hit include 1941-42, 1957-58, 1965-66, 1969-70, 2004-05. A lot of crazy cold in unusual patterns in those years. Look at March 1958 as an example, which hasn't been super dissimilar to weather lately. I sincerely doubt the Plains will have more than 2-3 months of extreme warmth in a row like they seem to be. Some kind of correction will come. I'd go less extreme than this, but these type of years seem clustered after the major hurricanes hit the Gulf of Mexico, especially in an El Nino. 1966, after Betsy is kind of the warm March counter example because severe cold came earlier than in the other years. I don't have a Spring Outlook yet, but I do think the Plains are going to pay for their warmth, that seems almost inevitable, it's just where it spreads.