PhiEaglesfan712

On 6/15/2024 at 8:41 AM, snowman19 said:

From back in 2021….but this -PDO/-PMM correlation for the summer pattern still applies now, especially with the -ENSO developing:
 

This prediction turned out to be wrong, as 2021 was a record breaking warm summer for most of the Western US.

2 hours ago, RedSky said:

Weather World - 25 of the next 35 days above average with 12 of those days 5F or more above average.

 

We're finally getting that Eastern ridging pattern of summer 2010-2012.

19 minutes ago, snowman19 said:

The 95-96 and 93-94 winters made that decade. If it wasn’t for those 2 winters, the 90’s would have been just as horrid as the 80’s, which only had the Megalopolis blizzard in ‘83 

Here at PHL, 1981-82 to 1984-85 was actually a good stretch. January 1982, 1984, and 1985 all had below zero cold shots and above average snow. (1/19/1994 was the only time in the almost 40 years since that we got a cold shot as bad as January 82, 84, 85.) Also, 82 and 83 had April snowstorms, and 84 had a cold and snowy March.

17 minutes ago, FPizz said:

If it wasn't for 95/96, the 90s would have hovered around 18" or less of snow for the decade for a lot of cities closer to NY.  Thankfully that season happened, but that one season really skewed the reality of the decade being bad for snow.  

1992-93 and 1993-94 were good seasons as well. 1993 had the famous blizzard in mid-March and 1994 had a cold wave in January as well as above average snow in February.

Regarding the 2009-10 snow season, I know there was a strong el nino and that likely contributed to record snow in the Mid-Atlantic, but why did the snow come to an abrupt end in places like Washington DC and Baltimore after the February 9-10 snowstorm?

5 hours ago, so_whats_happening said:

I do remember this winter, was the first winter I remember having severe weather in February (actually had nickel size hail falling and accumulate on the ground) to getting a 18" snowstorm a month later. Was definitely a roller coaster and that seems to be the case going forward at least in terms of what happens around the mid atlantic. We have really really warm periods or really really cold periods (nothing seems too sustained) and really snowy periods or nothing at all and flooded by rainstorm after rainstorm. 

Again looking locally only, we do not seem to be able to properly keep the ground frozen for a long period of time anymore. We do get a hard freeze but when temps in the middle of winter don't have a sustained low below 20* for more than a few days it becomes rather hard to keep a solid frozen ground. This rather warm low also makes it a bit difficult sometimes with these systems that have us right along the boundary. What use to be the rain/snow line around 95 has definitely pushed back further NW compared to say just 15 years ago. Much more in the way of mixing situations around my locale when we would manage just to be able to squeak out an all snow event. Just a few things I have noticed more so over the last probably 10 or so years. This is not to say we have never experienced this just that it seems to be happening of more frequency.

Working at BWI for almost the last 9 years we have had pretty bad snowfall ever since the 15-16 winter and the only reason we got something decent then was because of that monster snowstorm in January of 2016. The last close to average snowfall was 2018-19 with 18.3". We have had quite a few extremely low snowfall years of recent (from about 2000 area on) when they would occur maybe once a decade before. 

There does tend to be a noticeable decline in snowfall after these heat spikes have occurred, but unfortunately snowfall can have rather wild swings down here.

https://www.weather.gov/media/lwx/climate/bwisnow.pdf

The crazy part about that 50 inches of snow in February 2010 is that almost all of it took place during the first 10 days of the month, with a tenth of an inch of snow on the 15th, and then the snow just suddenly stopped for the season. At that point in the season, Baltimore had more snow than Syracuse (and any other city) in the Golden Snow Globe contest in 2009-10: https://goldensnowglobe.com/baltimore-storms-past-syracuse-for-the-lead/

https://goldensnowglobe.com/stwc-vol-2-update/

Baltimore was passed by Syracuse on Valentine's Day and never looked back: https://goldensnowglobe.com/stwc-vol-2-outcome/

50 inches of snow in 10 days and 80 inches of snow is something that will almost likely never happen again in Baltimore.

Even 2020-21 and 2021-22 were one month winters (February 2021 and January 2022) that were hit and miss here in the Philly viewing area. The early February 2021 snowstorm was a blockbuster to the north and west (not so much in the south and east), while the late January 2022 snowstorm was a blockbuster to the south and east (not so much north and west). PHL topped out at about 7.5 inches on both storms. There hasn't been a true blockbuster storm for the whole Philly viewing area since January 2016.

I highly doubt we're going to have a JFM colder than 2015 any time soon. Didn't JFM 2015 set a record for the coldest JFM in the Eastern US?

5 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

While you are certainly correct about this, part of the reason why March 2023 failed was just brutal luck, as well. About 40 miles away from Boston had a 3' snowfall in March 2023 and it was only some idiosyncracies with the respect to the development of the secondary that prevented the immediate Boston area from pulling off a very memorable snowfall, as well. Again, there is validaty to your assertion, but as always the devil is in the details.

I think it was more of a case where the pattern formed way too late in the season for anything to really happen. Had that pattern formed in late December 2022 instead, we would have gotten a very cold February and March 2023, as seen by the blocking pattern we got in June 2023. That late April rainstorm would have been a big blizzard in early February, followed by a dry cold pattern most of February and the first half of March, and exited that with another snowstorm near the spring equinox. (Remember the record cold highs around the summer solstice last year. Now imagine how cold that would have been if that was late March instead.)

2016-17 wasn't enso neutral. It was a weak la nina. We had the 5 trimonthlys of -0.5 on the NOAA ONI, and got down to -0.7 on both the Eric Webb Ensemble and NOAA ONI. We even got down to -1.09 on the RONI. 

2014-15 has a better argument for enso neutral than 2016-17. That one had the same strength as 2016-17 on the ONI, and only 0.58 on the RONI.

So, the only ones that can be considered enso neutral are 2001-02, 2003-04, 2012-13, 2013-14, and maybe 2019-20 (an ENSO neutral on the RONI, but you could argue a continuation of a weak el nino on the ONI that began in 2018).

15 hours ago, Stormchaserchuck1 said:

March 2023 too, we had a -NAO and -EPO for some time. It amounted to nothing.  I think later in the -PNA decadal phase a SE ridge becomes more constant vs early in the cycle. That's something I think we could batteling again this Winter, even if the NAO goes negative. 

It was just too late in the season. However, we did get a nice blocking pattern in June (who could forget about the smoke out). June 2023 was the coldest June since 1985.

Would have been nice if we had -NAO and -EPO in late December or even early February. 

I know 2024-25 is not likely going to be an ENSO neutral season (we haven't really had a true one since 2013-14), but I've noticed that since 1950, we've pretty much come out of every ENSO neutral phase with an el nino, and never a la nina. (If you don't count 2019-20 as an ENSO neutral season, in which a stubborn weak el nino refused to dissipate, then the last time we exited an ENSO neutral phase with a la nina was in 1949.) Is there a reason why ENSO neutral phases generally lead to el ninos, or is this just a coincidence?

On 6/5/2024 at 7:12 AM, bluewave said:

This goes to what I have been saying in earlier posts in this thread. The winter 13-14 and 14-15 Northeast Pacific blocking pattern has shifted to the summer. Some were expecting a repeat of those winters in 19-20 when the marine heatwave exceeded those levels during the summer. But the pattern weakened heading into the fall and winter allowing the MJO 4-7 and supercharged SPV to dominate during the 19-20 winter. 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-15820-w

Summer 2019 observations show a rapid resurgence of the Blob-like warm sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies that produced devastating marine impacts in the Northeast Pacific during winter 2013/2014. Unlike the original Blob, Blob 2.0 peaked in the summer, a season when little is known about the physical drivers of such events

 

I'm not sure if it's a shift to summer because the Northeast Pacific blocking pattern was there in the summers of 2014 and 2015, maybe even late summer 2013. The onset was about the same for both seasons (2013 or 2014), it's just that the pattern never seems to be in place in the winter after 2015. The most amazing thing about this 10+ year Northeast Pacific summer blocking pattern is that the only summers here in the Eastern US that were below average were 2014 and 2023. Oddly enough, both of those years were pre-nino summers. 2016 and 2020, the post-nino summers, were well above average (only trailing 2022). Those three summers were among the warmest ever in many places in the Eastern US.

As for 2019-20, that was one of the weirdest years ever. There was a stubborn weak el nino that just refused to dissipate. It didn't until fully until the spring.

2 hours ago, snowman19 said:

If that happens the RONI will be rivaling 73-74 and 88-89

That RONI plot is just a combination of the 2010-11 and 1998-99 peaks. I used the 2010 analog through OND, and then changed to 1998-99 starting with NDJ. I'm not so sure we even hit the 2010-11 peak of -1.7 now that we've fallen behind the pace.

The ONI is just 1988 shifted 3 months until OND, then change to 1998-99 starting with NDJ.

My prediction for 2024-25 ONI & RONI:

AMJ 2024 ONI: +0.3; RONI: -0.45

MJJ 2024 ONI: 0.0; RONI: -0.87

JJA 2024 ONI: -0.5; RONI: -1.17

JAS 2024 ONI: -1.0; RONI: -1.42

ASO 2024 ONI: -1.4; RONI: -1.61

SON 2024 ONI: -1.5; RONI: -1.70

OND 2024 ONI: -1.4; RONI: -1.70

NDJ 2024-25 ONI: -1.4; RONI: -1.65

DJF 2024-25 ONI: -1.3; RONI: -1.53

JFM 2025 ONI: -1.1; RONI: -1.24

FMA 2025 ONI: -0.9; RONI: -1.00

MAM ONI (NOAA): + 0.7C

Best analog: 1988 (-3 months)

JJA 1987: +1.6 -> SON 2023: +1.6

JAS 1987: +1.7 -> OND 2023: +1.7

ASO 1987: +1.8 -> NDJ 2023-24: +1.8

SON 1987: +1.7 -> DJF 2023-24: +1.7

OND 1987: +1.4 -> JFM 2024: +1.5 (NOAA)

NDJ 1987-88: +1.1 -> FMA 2024: +1.1 (NOAA)

DJF 1987-88: +0.7 -> MAM 2024: +0.7 (NOAA)

MAM RONI: + 0.11C

Best analog: 2010

NDJ 2009   1.57 DJF 2010   1.45 JFM 2010   1.09 FMA 2010   0.62 MAM 2010   0.07 

NDJ 2023   1.47 DJF 2024   1.21 JFM 2024   0.86 FMA 2024   0.48 MAM 2024   0.11 

1 hour ago, snowman19 said:

This SSTA animation is showing very well defined tropical instability waves (“TIWs”), which are indicative of real healthy La Niña event developing. Enhanced trade winds and easterly wind bursts usually follow. To me, this suggests that at the very least, a moderate event becoming more and more likely. It is forming more rapidly than both ‘98 and ‘10 were at this point in time
 

I figured that it would be performing ahead of 1998 at this time, as that was a stronger nino that dissipated later. However, the fact that it is performing ahead of 2010 suggests this is going to be a strong la nina. Remember, the 2009-10 el nino peaked lower than 2023-24 (at least on the ONI).

Spring 2024 at PHL ends up at 57.1F, which replaces Spring 2022 as the 6th warmest spring on record. It also brings up the average spring temps for the 2020s to 55.69F, which pushes it past the 2010s:

1890s - 51.84

1900s - 52.51

1910s - 52.98

1920s - 53.23

1930s - 53.18

1940s - 52.81

1950s - 52.83

1960s - 51.31

1970s - 53.16

1980s - 52.89

1990s - 53.85

2000s - 54.17

2010s - 55.38

2020s - 55.69 (through 2024)

Don't forget that the El Nino (which started in 1986) dissipated much earlier in 1988 than this year. The extra 3 months allowed the 1988-89 to develop into that strength. The La Nina strength was already at -1.4 by MJJ in 1988 and hovered in that -1.4/-1.5 range until ASO, before deepening in strength. If we shift that 3 months forward, then we'd be getting into the -1.4 in ASO, and hover around there through NDJ, but by this point, most La Ninas have reached their peaks.

It's going to be interesting to see if the RONI converges back towards the ONI. If not, the 1973-74 and 1988-89 values for the RONI could be breached.

My guess is that 2024-25 ends up being a moderate la nina on the NOAA ONI (not meeting the criteria of 3-trimonthlys of -1.5C), and a strong la nina on the Eric Webb Ensemble ONI.

2 hours ago, Spartman said:

Maybe start trending toward Neutrals. Feeling this is just not the year for a Nina.

Today's Nino 3.4 chart seems to be off the wall.

I still like the 1988 (-3 months) analog on the ONI until NDJ 2024-25. I think we're going to peak at -1.4 or -1.5C in ASO 2024 through NDJ 2024-25.

7 hours ago, Ralph Wiggum said:

Can the rgem be trusted in this type of synoptic setup?

 

It's possible. The storm just needs to continue with its slight north trajectory. This is the current radar: 

5 hours ago, Stormchaserchuck1 said:

I think recent trends favor warmer than normal, since 85% of our months are ending up this way now on average. And we are having peaks, where we hit 80 in DC on Jan 26th, which was the first time ever for I think 12-1 to 2-28 (the coldest day of the year on average is Jan 27th).  I am no way getting the super warm Winter vibe though, part of that is the N. Atlantic SST index that I monitor for the following Winter's NAO is slightly negative, and it's been a temperate Spring, which went against the SE ridge trend that I thought would prevail. Arctic ice is also all the way down to 14th lowest.  I also found the SW, US leads us a lot of the time, and when they were getting anomalous High pressure all the time 1995-2020, that boded bad for future Winter's, but the last 2 years troughs have really dug deep into the SW, which has broken that trend a little bit. 

I get the feeling 2024-25 is going to be a below average temperature winter. We are just well overdue for one. The last one that came below normal was at PHL was in 2014-15, which is going to be ten years ago. We came close in 2017-18 (the first half of that winter was very cold), but February was well above average, pushing that winter to an above average temperature finish.

1975-76 was the opposite of this year. That one was considered a strong la nina by the NOAA ONI (peaked at -1.7), while the RONI only peaked at -1.14

1976 clearly marked the transion from a la nina state (which began in 1949-50) to an el nino state. The question is whether this current la nina state started in 1998, 2005, or 2007. If it started in 1998, then the la nina state should be coming to an end soon. If in 2007, we might have another decade before we transition back into an el nino state.