George001

Weed?

Outside of Feb, it looks decent even in the northern mid atlantic, neutral or negative NAO with poleward alaskan ridging. For us in New England that h5 look for the winter as a whole would be the 2nd best we’ve seen since 2014-2015 (only 2017-2018 had a better h5).

In the New England forum this guy tried to argue that the model looked ugly for Jan and Feb, yet if you actually look at monthly NAO data it only looks ugly for Feb. He legit tried to punt an entire extra month in the heart of winter and was hoping nobody would notice. If you want to make an argument for a mild winter that’s fine, and there are legitimate factors to point to (such as the Siberian snowcover, low ACE, ect). However, this guy straight up has no idea how to analyze an H5 map. Theres nothing wrong with that in itself, but you should pretend that you understand something when you don’t. I only understand how to analyze H5 maps at a very basic level myself and even I can see that his analysis is way off.

This is bad analysis, the H5 does not look ugly. The NAO is neutral and there is some poleward Alaskan ridging with some SE ridging as well. If you look at the monthly NAO values, the only month that looks ugly is Feb with a raging positive NAO.

Agreed, it’s not realistic to expect a wall to wall winter. Even if we get 2 shitty months, if we capitalize in the other 2 months we can still get a very good winter. The big question is if we will be able to capitalize or not on the windows of opportunity we do get. I’m looking forward to reading your winter forecast and hearing your thoughts on what to expect this coming winter.

January looks great to me, I doubt most on this thread will care that DC and Philly gets screwed in that pattern because we live in New England. Just like how the DC and Philly folks were happy (rightfully so, who cheers on snow for people living hundreds of miles away?) when they cashed in and we got screwed 2009-2010. It it’s not a Feb 2015 look with 2-3 feet blizzards every week obviously but that doesn’t make it bad. The SE ridge actually helps to prevent suppression, and there’s poleward Aleutian ridging, so it would probably be a cold snowy pattern for us on the right side of the gradient with a foot here, a foot there while DC and Philly rain. I live in New England, so Im a big fan of the January h5 look, hell even your area in NYC the January pattern looks decent. As for Feb I agree, that looks rough.

Isn’t the best month in La Niña patterns usually January? Yeah the blocking breaks down in Jan but often that’s when you get the strongest blizzards, when the blocking breaks down (like during late Jan last year). Then yeah, Feb and March are usually ass because like you said, the same forcing that helps in earlier in the winter starts working against us later on.

Is Isotherm still doing winter forecasts?

Yeah I don’t understand the anti La Niña sentiment among snow weenies especially NYC north. The negative PDO just means the Nina is coupled or acting like a Nina right? If so then yeah the PDO will probably negative again this year because we have a La Niña and the MEI is -1.8. That will probably drop some but if the models have the right idea the Nina should be well coupled and act like a Nina, which really isn’t anything to be afraid for weenies NYC north. Didnt pretty much everywhere NYC north get buried 2010-2011? My area got around double our average snowfall that year.

Well I’ve never once seen you bullish on a winter or specific snow threat. That’s fine, you are entitled to your opinion but whether you realize it or not your bias is as obvious as Bastardis. You actually make good posts and seem to know your shit, but like Bastardi in my opinion your bias is so strong it negatively impacts your forecasts. I agree with you on Bastardi though, the big issue I have with Bastardi is his climate change skepticism. He is very knowledgeable about meteorology but his refusal to incorporate AGW into his forecasts is making them worse and worse as climate change accelerates. Ignoring climate change when making a winter forecast is like trying to build a championship baseball roster while ignoring pitching (This is why the Red Sox sucked ass this year).

And you aren’t biased? You always call for a blowtorch winter with no snow which makes no sense. Hedging warmer than average when 50/50 due to climate change? Yeah that’s reasonable, and most of the long range guys I follow are hedging that way. But calling for a 2011-2012 type winter every year or downplaying every storm threat makes you just as biased as Bastardi. Some winters like 2015-2016 the signals were overwhelmingly pointing to a blowtorch, others like 2014-2015 they overwhelmingly pointed towards an icebox. This fall is in between, with signs pointing towards neither a blowtorch or icebox, just an average New England winter that will be decent for some areas, bad for others (like the past couple winters).

A lot of North Atlantic blocking, nice.

Yeah it’s way too early to write winter off. The La Nina = bad thing is nonsense, we have had plenty of great winters in La Nina’s. Even if the La Niña is moderate instead of weak that doesn’t mean it’s going to be a blowtorch with no snow. 2010-2011 was a strong La Niña, much stronger than this one is expected to be and had several monster blizzards.

Negative NAO for Dec, Jan, and Mar, neutral for Feb. If that’s right the mild and snowless Jan and Feb calls are going to bust big time.

Im extremely bullish on this coming winter for our region, I’m not buying the mild Jan and Feb at all. The late increase in tropical activity this fall is leading to us avoiding a low ACE season. The early Siberian snowcover data, La Niña peaking in the fall instead of later in the winter like last year, ect makes me think we have a good chance at getting buried. It will likely have its mild periods as all winters do, but the rapid weakening of the Nina I think could lead to a monster Feb and or March. Nina climo is favorable during Dec and Jan, and unfavorable during Feb and Mar so the early peak of the Nina could mean that we are getting the typical Nina Dec and Jan, but not the mild Feb and Mar. It’s weather so there’s never any guarantees, but I like our chances right now. I’ll take this look over a moderate or strong nino any day.

Active northern stream with lots of Miller Bs instead of southern stream driven Miller Asshole? Sign me up!

I don’t think getting the enso state wrong 6 months out from winter means you are a terrible forecaster. Maybe it looked like it would be warm neutral at the time, but things change.

Wow. There are a few lows deepening to the 950s and 960s. People wrote off this hurricane season as a low ACE season too soon. 150 ACE can’t be ruled out based on what the models are saying.

The ACE index is increasing a lot after a slow start. Average is around 120, and we are currently on pace for around 110 but the models are showing a more active pattern coming up. Due to this it may not be a low ACE year after all.

The interesting thing about Ninas vs Ninos is Boston is better off with a super Nina than a moderate Nino, but is also better off with a weak Nino than any Nina (in general based on the data). In practice it’s more complicated than this, it would be interesting to see how the data looks if you break it down by structure, when said enso event peaks, the impact the enso state of the previous winter has, ect.

For what it’s worth the MEI is already starting to rise. Ray mentioned in his blog that this is something to watch out for. It peaked at -2.2 and the latest update had it rising to -1.8, this could be a sign that the dynamical guidance has the right idea of weakening the Nina earlier vs the statistical guidance having a moderate Nina into late winter.

yeah I’m just rooting for a weak PV and good pacific, no need for an SSW or anything crazy to get a good winter here. If anything SSWs can hurt sometimes if the polar vortex goes to the wrong side of the globe.

Yeah being unwilling to use other people’s ideas is not a good mentality to have. This is true for just about everything, when I first started playing chess I tried making up my own openings and didn’t want to castle because everyone else did it and I wanted to be original. I sucked, and got my ass kicked over and over again until I started reading books and applying the ideas from them to my own games. Even the best chess player in the world, Magnus Carlsen has a team of coaches to help him with opening prep. There are a lot of great minds on this site, if you are making a forecast without trying to incorporate research from others you would be doing yourself a disservice.

Holy shit that Nina looks stronger than 2010-2011. Yeah the other guidance disagrees with that and there are already signs that the Nina is starting to peak with the subsurface warming up. It’s weird that it has a ridge in the west and east though, I would think there would be a trough out west if there is a ridge in the east.

I’m all in. Big Greenland block, weak La Niña and a ridge out west. If this develops December and January could end up both being great months.