PhiEaglesfan712

I'm hoping this early January cold spell is short and a relaxation happens during the 2nd half of the month. I'd rather have that than cold all January and a relaxation in February because that's almost always a kiss of death for the winter.

That would make 2021-22 probably the best fit ONI/RONI/MEI analog. That was the year the ONI started to drift apart from the RONI and MEI.

I actually think the below normal temperatures for the 1/4 to 1/17 period will be contained to south of DCA. North of DCA, I think we'll see near normal temperatures for that period, and well above average temperatures for the last 2 weeks of January.

Spoiler alert: The next 3 months brings epic cold and snowfall. It will be the snowiest season until 1996, and you won't get a January-March this cold in the next 35 years.

The closest analogs are 05-06, 08-09, and 21-22. Two of these (2006 and 2009) flipped to el nino the following year (with one, 09-10, being a strong el nino), while the third (2022) stayed a la nina. Oddly enough, the two that flipped to el nino produced strong la ninas in year 2, while the one that stayed a la nina flipped to a strong el nino in year 2. So I guess whatever ENSO state we have in 2025-26, we'll have the reverse in 2026-27 (and likely a strong event).

Not necessarily. The late season la ninas in 2006 and 2009 went straight to el nino the following year, with the latter (2009-10) being a strong el nino. Although, each case produced a strong la nina in the second year following (2007-08 and 2010-11). On the flip side, the late season la nina in 2022 continued into 2022-23, but went strong el nino during the 2nd year following. My guess is that the 2022 scenario is more likely, but history favors 2026-27 having the opposite ENSO (in extreme strength) of 2025-26.

2009-10 in the Baltimore/Wash DC area is another. Baltimore had 80 in of snow in 2 months (from 12/19 to 2/10 - they even had more snow than Syracuse at that point in the season), before the snow came to an end all of a sudden. March 2010 was very warm, and it was summerlike by the first week of April 2010.

JFM 2014 and JFM 2015 was wall-to-wall cold everywhere in the East. Those were the coldest JFMs since 1978. 93-94 was another wall-to-wall cold winter.

I'm assuming he's talking about 93-94 because 94-95 was a very warm winter, especially December and January. 93-94 was wall-to-wall cold, and had the last below zero day at PHL (-5 on 1/19/1994).

Yeah, February 2006 and February 2021 are classical examples of cold/snow happening with a -PNA. This was following long periods of warm and virtually snowless weather during +PNA.

The pattern came back again for the last week of March. Turned a +4 temperature departure for the first 3 weeks to near normal. Of course, it was too late for snow here at PHL, but places more north got snow in late March 2011. PHL: 2011-03-23 43 38 40.5 -5.2 24 0 0.23 0.0 0 2011-03-24 44 33 38.5 -7.5 26 0 0.02 T 0 2011-03-25 45 28 36.5 -9.9 28 0 0.00 0.0 0 2011-03-26 43 27 35.0 -11.8 30 0 0.00 0.0 0 2011-03-27 46 30 38.0 -9.1 27 0 0.00 0.0 0 2011-03-28 47 28 37.5 -10.0 27 0 0.00 0.0 0 2011-03-29 52 31 41.5 -6.4 23 0 0.00 0.0 0 2011-03-30 51 33 42.0 -6.2 23 0 T 0.0 0 2011-03-31 44 39 41.5 -7.1 23 0 0.05 0.0 0 NYC: 2011-03-23 40 32 36.0 -8.8 29 0 0.87 T 0 2011-03-24 44 30 37.0 -8.2 28 0 0.09 1.0 1 2011-03-25 42 28 35.0 -10.5 30 0 0.00 0.0 0 2011-03-26 40 26 33.0 -12.9 32 0 0.00 0.0 0 2011-03-27 45 28 36.5 -9.7 28 0 0.00 0.0 0 2011-03-28 45 26 35.5 -11.1 29 0 0.00 0.0 0 2011-03-29 49 31 40.0 -6.9 25 0 0.00 0.0 0 2011-03-30 53 36 44.5 -2.8 20 0 0.01 0.0 0 2011-03-31 43 37 40.0 -7.7 25 0 0.13 T 0 BOS: 2011-03-20 40 30 35.0 -4.2 30 0 0.00 0.0 2011-03-21 41 34 37.5 -2.0 27 0 0.16 0.3 2011-03-22 44 35 39.5 -0.3 25 0 0.00 0.0 2011-03-23 40 32 36.0 -4.1 29 0 0.00 0.0 2011-03-24 39 31 35.0 -5.4 30 0 0.01 0.2 2011-03-25 45 30 37.5 -3.2 27 0 0.00 0.0 2011-03-26 41 26 33.5 -7.5 31 0 0.00 0.0 2011-03-27 45 27 36.0 -5.4 29 0 0.00 0.0 2011-03-28 48 28 38.0 -3.7 27 0 0.00 0.0 2011-03-29 49 32 40.5 -1.5 24 0 0.00 0.0 2011-03-30 55 34 44.5 2.1 20 0 0.00 0.0 2011-03-31 44 33 38.5 -4.2 26 0 0.35 0.6

The last week of December doesn't look like a torch after all. I don't think we're going to get the really cold Jan 4-17 the models are showing. It will probably be closer to normal. No way are we getting anything close to a 13-14 type winter, which was wall-to-wall cold from Jan-March. I think we're going to get something closer to 20-21.

About 2 in, but even as recently as the 22nd morning, temps were in the mid-60s. Earlier in the month, temps were in the 70s. That snowstorm came out of the blue.

1983-84 definitely is not because that was a +PDO winter. 1998-99 is an okay analog. That was the winter when we switched back to -PDO. Thing I don't like about 98-99 was that December 98 was really warm right up until a few days before the "Christmas Miracle" snowstorm on Dec. 23-24. We had a good 3 weeks of snow until mid-January, then nothing really until mid-March.

What's a perma-nina?

What was the PNA in February 1986, February 2006, and February 2021?

Looks like a toss-up between ENSO neutral and la nina conditions for 2025-26:

If this is right, then a January 2011 redux is almost certainly going to happen. However, I am very skeptical of any of this coming to fruition.

No "cold oval" for late January: Hopefully, this means a return to cold weather during the first week of February.

Even if we don't get a Christmas miracle this year, we'll always have 1998. On the morning of Dec. 22, temps were in the mid-60s before dropping drastically throughout the day. That set the stage for an unexpected snowstorm on Dec. 23-24.

Yeah, here are the subsequent Jan PNAs for non-Nino high PNA Dec, following warm Nov: 2021 +0.19 (Dec 2020: +1.58) 2006 +0.43 (Dec 2005: +1.38) 1986 +0.97 (Dec 1985: +1.39) Based on these analogs, the PNA should be slightly positive (between 0 and 1). By the way, all of these years had warmer Januarys, and delayed cold until February.

If the pattern supports a shift to cold, shouldn't it look something like this, and not a cold oval over the heart of I-95?

More realistic forecast (no cold oval):

Yeah, that "cold oval" isn't going to happen, lol.

PHL's last snowfall of over a foot was Jan. 22-23, 2016. In fact, we can't seem to get past 8 in. since then. Places west got foot plus totals on Jan. 31-Feb. 2, 2021, while places east got foot plus totals on Jan. 28-29, 2022. Talk about bad luck.