dallen7908

WRT to the cold CFS ... The following is part of the CPC 3-4 week outlook. Did the forecaster Kyle MacRitchie mean to say "over-forecasts cold in the Northeast" or am I missing something. Anyways they "forecast" a 50% (50%) chance of above (below) normal temperatures during week 3/4. They do forecast warmer than normal temperatures and precipitation over the southeast. The weenie in me says we could be on the cold end of something substantial. The ECMWF and JMA models, as well as a number of SubX models, forecast weaker troughing over Canada and suggest a warmer pattern over the eastern CONUS than the CFS does. Our calibration routine also lowers the cold probabilities in the CFS so that they appear more in-line with the ECMWF and JMA, which suggests that the CFS historically over-forecasts warmth in the Northeast.

Which is more likely, another December like this one or another February like last one? My hunch is that February 2015's weather was less abnormal but haven't run the statistics. Thoughts?

Remember Ian's article about how uncommon 1" and above snows are becoming at DCA. Well in today's Washington Post there is a non-technical article by Reid Wilson on California's drought that speculates that melting of Arctic ice may be 'contributing to a slowing of the jet stream contributing to colder wetter weather in the eastern U.S. and more persistently dry conditions in the west". I guess for every winner there is a loser. Kind of reminds me of spring 2010, when several hopeful posters here speculated that 2009/2010 could become the new norm or last winter when several scientific articles predicted that melting of Arctic ice could be responsible for warmer eastern U.S. winters and colder European winters.