Roger Smith

Another tie? Memo to self, widen column FG. That was and remains the latest April day not to hit 80F or higher at NYC.

Did you know that this outbreak included two F4 tornadoes in south central ON, one was near Grand Valley northwest of Toronto and another one hit Barrie north of Toronto where eight people were killed? That storm continued on for about two hours and dropped funnels several more times towards Peterborough ON where an F-1 did some damage in southwest suburbs. I was living in Peterborough at that time, and we were on the north side of the cell where we got a fairly severe storm too. It was quite a strong cold front on a Friday, the next day I was playing golf and there was a westerly wind blowing at 30-40 mph all day and it was much colder too. It had been near 85F on the afternoon of the 31st before the line of storms arrived.

The low tracked from about Colorado to Ohio 4th to 6th when it redeveloped over New Jersey and a 980 mb center formed south of Long Island, which tracked past Cape Cod into the Gulf of Maine 7th-8th with a very tight circulation. Here's a link to maps: http://www.wetterzentrale.de/reanalysis.php?map=2&model=noaa&var=1&jaar=1982&maand=04&dag=06&uur=1200&h=1&tr=360&nmaps=24#mapref With the previous low that moved past to the north on 3rd-4th, NYC recorded 1.86" of rain on 3rd, then 9.6" snow on 6th from liquid equivalent of 1.11". The daily high/low values from 1st to 10th are 65/46 58/36 56/43 52/32 48/27 41/21 30/21 43/25 39/34 53/34. Would have to think the max of 41F on 6th was early, the low reformed between 06z and 12z so it may have been briefly a rain-snow mix turning to all snow. The 21F must have been at midnight as it applies to 7th as well. Toronto also had extreme values that set daily records for temperature (max 22F on 6th, min 13F on 7th) but the total snowfall there was only 3.2 cm or 1.3". About 5-7" fell across southern Quebec and 8-12" in the Canadian maritimes from late 6th to early 8th, there must have been some much higher snowfalls in New England though. I found one link that states the NWS forecast 14" from a blizzard for Boston but the article didn't mention actual amounts.

Given that GFS output for mid-April warmth, here's an average of daily highs from April to October for the four years with most impressive heat around same time, namely 1896, 1941, 1976 and 2002. The blue data represent daily calendar day averages Apr 1 to Oct 31. The orange data are slightly shifted for 1941 and 1976 so that all four have their peak day of mid-April warmth on the 18th. 1941 is shifted three days (so it runs from Mar 29 to Oct 28), and 1976 back by one day (runs Apr 2 to Nov 1). The most salient points would be continued relative warmth all of May and second half of June into July, not as impressive a warm signal by August, a slight recovery to warmth in early September, and a colder signal in October, although October 1941 had some record warmth in the first third. I also looked at rainfall amounts and those were generally dry to near end of May then mostly wet through summer and autumn months, in each case at least one month was very wet.

Maybe it would be good to speed up that timetable, figure out a way of modulating this energy, so we don't get tornadoes any more. I will say 3200-3700 AD for that one. And I am not optimistic we will still be around then at this rate.

Sure am, they were in the prime position overnight. And I think one day science will catch up. There has been a lot of work done by other researchers in curved bands within the solar system magnetic field, the only difference in my research is that I co-locate these with Jupiter and to some extent other planets. And if there are powerful signals involved, then moons of those planets would modulate the signals. I have no expectation of recognition of these theories in my lifetime, the over/under on when it will be recognized is about 2400-2700 AD and it would take somebody with a better designed career path than mine, I have been more or less blacklisted (for other reasons) since 1980. And I used to care about that but I don't now as my life has been splendid and I have done everything I wanted to do and a lot more. So whether people believe me or not is the least of my concerns or worries. I might add that the elites running our world are not exactly showing themselves to be an infallible brain trust but that's not my problem at age 74. Well 73.9 getting ahead of the curve there. (People may be confused by this exchange and I don't want to derail the thread given that a very dangerous severe weather potential exists for a large part of the forum, so I would just say the key point is that a lot of severe weather outbreaks show a strong correlation with times where Jupiter's magnetic field would be at a peak state of disturbance, and this happens at predictable times that are roughly 3.5 days apart and which peak in cycles of 435 days, which being longer than an earth year by about 20% means that roughly every five years the peak coincides with the spring months. However it would also be relevant to locate the earth's orbital position relative to the curved portions of the solar system magnetic field, so it's not as simple as saying there is a five year cycle of severe weather events ... I will leave it at that, my interest in severe weather is otherwise conventional and therefore this is seen as being a theory under development while I do normal meteorology). The dynamics of this system are pretty impressive whether it has anything to do with solar system magnetic fields or not.

Large tornado PDS warning in n/c AR near Franklin not far south of MO border. This is rather odd ... 3-18-1925, 4-3-1974, 2023. I suppose one might want to circle the 19th on one's calendar. Have to say, the trailing wave feature on this is taking a similar track to the 1925 event which ran about 150 miles south of the 1974 low (which in turn was a bit south of this one, at 21z on Apr 3 1974 there was a 986 mb low near Keokuk IA).

Remarkable to see temps at 0400h CDT near 80F around eastern MO and southern IL. As that cluster of cells develops I think it's going to get very severe in eastern Illinois and west-central Indiana later this morning towards 0900h. BUF and south area might get hit by the leading wave moving across sw ON overnight.

I was living about 100 miles north of Toronto when the 1974 event happened, we had a moderate thunderstorm roll through about midnight (3rd-4th) with a temperature near 12 C. It then warmed up to about 20 C during the day (4th). As you probably know a tornado hit Windsor ON evening of 3rd and caused nine fatalities at a curling rink that collapsed. But beyond that I am not aware of any severe storm activity further into southwest Ontario that night. One tornado that might have been quite close to your location in April 1967 (a day where Chicago was hit badly) was about an F-2 and I vaguely recall there being one fatality from that, somewhere around Exeter and or Mitchell ON. And more recently you'll maybe recall that extreme rainfall event on May 12, 2000.

Taking the list of 75+ days in first half of April that I posted yesterday, this is a frequency count of those days for twenty-two equal periods of seven years (not counting this year which as of April 13 will have four) ... 1869-1875 _ 3 1876-1882 _ 1 1883-1889 _ 2 1890-1896 _ 5 1897-1903_ 0 1904-1910_ 3 1911-1917 _ 2 1918-1924 _ 6 1925-1931 _ 6 1932-1938 _ 3 1939-1945 _ 7 1946-1952 _ 5 1953-1959 _ 4 1960-1966 _ 2 1967-1973 _ 4 1974-1980 _ 6 1981-1987 _ 5 1988-1994 _ 7 1995-2001 _ 2 2002-2008 _11 2009-2015 _ 10 2016-2022 _ 7 (total) ___ 101 (average per 7 yrs) _ 4.6 (average 1974-2022) _ 6.9 or nearly 1 per year (average 2002-2022) _ 9.3 or about 1.3 per year (average 1869-1917) _ 2.3 (per 7 yr) or about one every 3 years The interval 1918 to 1973 averages 4.6 (per 7 yr) or about 2 every 3 years ... so the pace is slowly increasing, although it was almost as active around the 1940s as it is now. The 1960s saw a drop back to about the frequency before 1910. The 101 warm days occurred in a total of 62 years, these 92 years did not have one ... 1869, 1870, 1872, 1873, 1874, 1875, 1876, 1877, 1878, 1879, 1881, 1882, 1883, 1884, 1885, 1886, 1888, 1889, 1891, 1893, 1894, 1895, 1897, 1898, 1899, 1900, 1901, 1902, 1903, 1904, 1905, 1906, 1907, 1909, 1911, 1913, 1914, 1915, 1916, 1919, 1920, 1923, 1924, 1926, 1927, 1931, 1932, 1933, 1935, 1936, 1937, 1939, 1940, 1943, 1944, 1948, 1951, 1952, 1953, 1956, 1957, 1958, 1961, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1966, 1969, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1979, 1980, 1982, 1983, 1984, 1988, 1990, 1992, 1993, 1995, 1997, 1998 (had several in late March), 2000, 2001, 2004, 2007, 2009, 2015, 2020, 2021 The have not years were 41 of the first 52, and 51 of the next 102 (1921-2022). That ratio is exactly half. From 1979 to 2022 the ratio was 20 of 44, so it has not fallen much. It has been five of 16 since 2007, under one third. Of all these "have not" years, only a few broke into the 80+ group for April 16-30, including 1899, 1915, 1923, 1927, 1962, 1990, 2007 and 2009.

The slow evolution and continued feed of near-record warmth will set up most of IL for late night heavy and locally severe, and then that will just edge further east and probably peak in a strong moderate or even low end high risk outcome in IN-OH-KY-TN tomorrow. The low is moving north rather than northeast and there is little push on the cold front until mid-day or even mid-afternoon. I continue to expect this to ramp up into a very severe conclusion. A separate cluster from ne OK and w AR will move into s MO and w TN and merge with the northern complex during the late morning.

Looking at summers that follow April record highs (or near misses) you can have the full range of outcomes so I wouldn't read much into it. Summers like 1941, 1955, 2002, 2010 are balanced by poor summers like 1915, 1942, 1967, 1976, 2009. You also get mid-range summers like 1892, 1929, 1977. I would not be surprised if the correlation was either random of slightly negative.

Very warm days at NYC April 1-15 A complete listing of days that reached 75F or higher. Current record highs bold type. Arranged by decades from 1869 to 2023. 1. .............................................. 83 1917 .............................................. 82 1978 ................75 2006..79 2016 ... 2. ................................................78 1918 ....77 1934. 75 1946..80 1963 81 1967................................................. 3. .............75 1892 ...............................................75 1945........................76 1967...81 1981 .......77 2002............. 4. .............80 1892......................78 1921...............76 1950..................75 1974.........................76 2010 .......... 5. .................................75 1910 ...79 1921..80 1928......................................75 1985.77 1989. .75 2010........... 6. ................................. 76 1910 79 1912,1921.77 1928..79 1947......................77 1991..75 2005...78 2010.80 2023. 7. ................................75 1908 .............89 1929 ...82 1942................................. 87 1991..78 2005...92 2010.. 8. .85 1871 ............................................88 1929 .........77 1954.83 1959 ......75 1986..90 1991. 80 1999 80 2010 .... 9. .83 1871 ...................................................................................76 1970...75 1981....86 1991..........82 2013........ 10. .80 1871 ..79 1887 ..................86 1922 ................79 1955 ................................75 1991....75 2008 ......... 11. ................ 78 1887 ..................80 1922 .................. 84 1955 .............................77 1987.......... 81 2011 80 2017 75 2023 12. ..............................................................................78 1947 ................90 1977............80 1996....76 2008 76 2017 84 2023. 13. .................79 1890 .77 1896 .......................81 1945 ...82 1968..(88 1977)76 1978...78 2006 77 2014..82 2018 77 2019 90 2023 14. ......80 1880 ......................... 76 1930 77 1938 (85 1941) 83 1945 79 1949 .........75 2002 75 2014.. 77 2018 .79 2022.91 2023 15. ......77 1880 ..... 79 1896 ....78 1925 ..84 1938 87 1941 78 1942 83 1960...76 1976..76 1994.82 2002 81 2003 80 2006 77 2012.. ___________________________________ If there's continued warmth I can post a similar graphic table for days 80+ in second half of April. Soon after this table ends, you get into the four-day 2002 and 1976 record heat waves both times reaching 96, the monthly maximum (17th 2002, 18th 1976). There was a similar heat wave in April 1896 (87, 88, 90 F followed the 79F shown for 15th above, all were broken in 2002 and or 1976). Some of the record highs from 1871 to 1910 are way below the pace, notably 7th had only hit 61F (1871) until 1904 edged it out at 62F, and 12th 68F in 1889 was the record until 73F in 1945. A reverse case would be April 2nd where the highest reading since the record high of 81F in 1967 is 73F in 1986 then only 68F from 2006, 2010. It was odd that 1929 lost two very impressive records of 89 and 88 (to 7th 2010 and 8th 1991), those values would have been at least tied records on any other day to April 25th except for 12th, 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th, 20th. (Note: edited in five new 75+ days in 2023 so far _ Apr 14)

The Wed map will quite possibly show considerably higher potential south into KY and TN in later versions. Dynamics look quite extreme even at this early stage, 25 C 850 mb readings in n TX, 110 knot 500 mb over n AZ and a surge northward of 20 C dew points into OK. I agree it looks to remain capped to near sunset but look out after that.

Thanks for running this contest, RodneyS, not that you had to do anything.

Fixed and made slight changes to consensus as a result.

I'm seeing a parallel to the Apr 3-4 1974 situation shifted a bit to the northwest, so therefore it could be extreme on two consecutive days because in 1974 the second day's outcome was somewhat diminished by having much of the severe zone over the Appalachians to mid-Atlantic states by mid-afternoon (there still was a minor resurgence), in this case the explosive development zone would be further west on Tuesday 4th (similar to Apr 3 1974 but shifted northwest) and as with 1974 it would be very active all night then become prone to redevelopment but more so because the cold front would still be west of the mountains in the Ohio valley by 18z-21z. A two-day outbreak with an overnight component and extreme potential in a heavily populated region, has super-outbreak potential. I fully expect to see high risk and PDS situations over all states from e KS to OH and e TX to GA, let's hope this either misfires or contains its worst cells to farmland because there could be quite a few long-track F3-5 cells involved in this.

Perhaps obvious but there seems to be high potential for this outbreak to continue most of the night 4th-5th across IL, IN, w OH and s MI, pause slightly and redevelop in OH-KY-TN on Wed 5th..It doesn't look a lot different from 4-4-74 to me. (the dynamics with this one are somewhat further north)

Tom, I will go easy on the late penalty, in part because you weren't able to post in March. Best wishes and get well soon. Also welcome to rainsucks, and welcome back to Rhino16 and StormchaserChuck. Later in the year I will post pro-rated scoring comparisons to let you know how your average score looks in comparison to the field, although it partly depends on what months you enter, last month's average score was a bit lower than usual. Table of forecasts for April 2023 FORECASTER _______________________ DCA _ NYC _ BOS __ ORD _ ATL _ IAH ___ DEN _ PHX _ SEA StormchaserChuck1 _________________+3.6 _+3.8 _+3.9 __ +3.6 _+4.0 _+3.3 ___ +0.5 __ 0.0 _ -1.0 hudsonvalley21 ______________________ +2.6 _+2.1 _+2.2 __ +1.1 __ +2.8 _+3.1 ___ +0.2 _ +0.3 _-2.3 wxdude64 ___________________________ +2.2 _+2.4 _+1.6 __ +0.7 _ +1.7 _+2.4 ___ +0.3 _ +0.6 _-1.7 wxallannj ____________________________ +2.2 _ +2.2 _+1.8 __ +2.2 _ +2.1 _ +2.9 ___ +1.4 _ +1.5 _ +1.0 Tom __________ (-2%) _________________ +2.1 _+1.1 _ +0.9 __ -1.1 __ +1.2 _ +0.8 ___ -1.1 __ -0.1 _ -1.1 RJay __________________________________+2.0 _+2.0 _+2.0 __ +1.5 _ +2.5 _+3.0 ___ +1.0 _ +1.0 _-2.0 Roger Smith __________________________+2.0 _+1.8 _ +1.5 __ +1.8 _ +2.8 _ +3.3 __ -0.8 _ -1.0 _ -0.5 ___ Consensus ________________________+2.0 _+1.5 _ +1.3 __ +1.0 _ +2.1 _ +2.1 __ -0.2 _ -0.1 _ -1.2 Rhino16 _______________________________+1.8 _+1.3 _ +1.3 __ +1.3 _ +1.8 _ +1.8 __ -0.1 __ -0.2 _ -1.4 BKViking _____________________________ +1.7 _ +1.5 _ +1.3 __ +0.8 _+2.1 _ +2.1 ___ -0.4 _-0.6 _ +1.0 DonSutherland1 ______________________+1.6 _ +1.5 _ +1.2 __ +0.3 _+2.2 _+1.8 ___ -0.3 _-1.5 _ -2.5 Scotty Lightning _____________________ +1.5 _ +1.0 _+1.0 __ +1.0 _ +1.5 _ +2.0 ___ +1.0 _ +1.5 _ +0.5 RodneyS _____________________________ +1.2 _ +1.1 _+0.7 __ -1.6 _ +0.4 _ +1.3 ___ -1.6 _ -1.3 _ -1.2 rainsucks ____________________________ +1.0 _+0.5 _-1.0 ___ -5.0_ +2.0 _ +1.5 ___ -2.5 _ +1.0 _ -2.0 ___ Normal _____________________________0.0 __ 0.0 __ 0.0 ____0.0 __ 0.0 __ 0.0 ____ 0.0 __ 0.0 __ 0.0 - - - - - - ___ Persistence _ (mar 2023) __________+1.5 _+1.8 _+2.5 ___-0.2 _+2.4 _+3.4 ___ -5.7 _-4.5 _-2.6 __________________________ Warmest and coldest forecasts are color coded (for forecasters). Normal is coldest for DCA, NYC, ATL, IAH.

I can add some details on that 1975 storm, which you are welcome to use tomorrow. I was living about 100 miles north of Toronto (which had over 10" of snow overnight 2nd-3rd) and we got an incredible dump of about 28 inches, would say the first half was synoptic scale and the second half was lake enhanced in NW winds off Georgian Bay. That was a fairly typical amount north of Toronto. Then the winds howled at 40-50 mph for two days and eventually the snow was reshaped into alternating bare spots and eight foot drifts all over the open countryside outside of larger towns. Many hundreds of people were stranded on regional highways during the storm, and ended up taking shelter in small towns around Barrie in Simcoe County, it was almost a week before some of them could get moving again, as the roads became totally impassable and plows couldn't get past the first mile or two of drifts. Where I lived, I was unable to move any of the snow drifts in my driveway because the daily freeze-thaw cycle in strong April sunshine ended up freezing them solid like concrete road barriers. There was about two weeks of quite cold and sunny weather with lows well below 20F at night, and this mess slowly evaporated away into the dry air. May of 1975 turned very hot and it stayed quite dry most of the summer in that region. It was certainly a weather singularity and in marked contrast to the 1974 super-tornado outbreak on 3rd-4th, and the early season heat in April of 1976 and 1977. You'll see there were some quite cold days at NYC after the storm, that was in part due to the strong NW winds blowing down off the extensive snow covered land. We were not breaking 25F in the daytime for the first few days after the storm, and eventually we were running about 15 degrees below normal for the month (it later relaxed a bit but still finished quite low). At Midhurst ON which is about thirty miles southwest of where I was located, the mean temperature for the first two weeks of April was -3.6 C (about 26 F) and normal there would be around 40F. They recorded 19" of snow in the blizzard, and over a week later there was a low of 8F there on the 11th of April.

=== === <<<< ---- ANNUAL SCORING for JAN-MAR 2023 ---- >>>> === === Best scores for the nine locations are shown with red highlight, best totals for regions in bold. Slight adjustments are likely for March scores. FORECASTER ____________ DCA_NYC_BOS__east__ORD_ATL_IAH__cent_ c/e__ DEN_PHX_SEA__west __ TOTALS RJay _______________________195 _192 _ 153 __ 540 __222 _187 _206__ 615 __1155 _ 155 _124 _238 __517 ____1670 DonSutherland1 ___________ 162 _120 _ 154 __ 436 __196 _204 _208 __608 __1044 __123 _194_220 __ 537 ____1581 wxallannj __________________ 155 _150 _183 __ 488 __ 199 _148 _212 __ 559 __1046 _ 123 _146 _ 188__ 457 ____1504 RodneyS __________________ 110 _ 118 _146 __ 374 __ 167 _ 87 _194 __ 448 __ 822 _ 221 _ 186 _254 __ 661____ 1483 hudsonvalley21 ____________135 _ 108 _ 173 __ 416 __206 _177 _187 __ 570 __ 986 __100 _142 _229 __ 471 ____ 1457 ___ Consensus _____________141 _ 128 _ 171 __ 440 __ 179 _126 _190 __ 495 __935 _ 127 _ 130 _236 __ 493 ____ 1428 wxdude64 _________________170 _ 139 _ 152 __ 461 __109 _124 _160 __ 393 __ 854 __ 165 _ 110 _208 __ 483 ____ 1337 BKViking __________________ 142 _ 134 _ 171 __ 447 __151 _112 _ 170 __ 433 __ 880 __ 109 _088 _ 168 __365 ____ 1245 Roger Smith _______________ 112 _ 104 _ 152 __ 368 __135 _ 95 _ 176 __ 406 __774 __ 111 _ 134 _222 __ 467 ____ 1241 Scotty Lightning ___________ 125 _124 _ 128 __ 377 __125 _107 _184 __ 416 __ 793 ___ 106 _ 46 _ 168 __ 330 ____ 1113 so_whats_happening (2/3) _ 90 _ 82 _ 138 ___ 310 __ 101 _ 41 _134 __ 276 __ 586 __ 98 __ 96 _ 148 __ 342 _____ 928 Tom (2/3) __________________ 90 _ 75 _ 126 ___ 291 ___ 87 _ 52 _ 112 __ 251 __ 542 __ 118 _ 94 _ 146 __ 358 _____ 900 ___ Normal _________________ 70 __ 64 __88 __ 222 ___ 96 _ 52 _ 94 ___ 242 __ 464 __ 118 _ 098 _ 168 __ 384 _____848 Stormchaser Chuck (1/3) __ 87 _ 86 _ 32 ___ 205 ___ 93 _ 64 _ 86 ___ 243 __ 448 ___ 48 _ 84 __ 94 __ 226 _____ 674 Rhino16 (1/3) ______________ 54 _ 44 _ 30 ___ 128 ___ 68 _ 62 _ 24 ____ 154 __ 282 ___ 19 __ 04 __ 84 __ 107 ______389 _______________________________________________________ ___ Persistence ___________ 91 _ 84 _108 __ 283 __ 60 _ 85 _ 214 __ 359 __ 642 __ 88 _214 _128 ___ 430 ____1072 Best Forecasts * shared with one other forecaster for one month (does not apply to Consensus or Normal, if they qualify, so does the high forecaster score whether tied or not) FORECASTER ____________ DCA_NYC_BOS__east__ORD_ATL_IAH__cent_ c/e__ DEN_PHX_SEA__west __ Months RJay _______________________ 1 ____ 2 ____ 1 ____2 ____ 1*___2**____ 1 ___ 1 ___ 1 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 1 ___ 0 ____ 0 DonSutherland1 ___________ 0 ____ 0 ____ 0 ___ 0 ____ 2*____2*____0____ 2 ___ 1 ___ 0 ___ 2 ___ 1* ___0 ____2 _ Jan,Mar wxallannj __________________ 0 ____ 0 ____ 0 ___ 0 ____ 0 ____0 ____0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ____0 RodneyS ___________________0 ____ 0 ____ 0 ___ 0 ____ 0 ____0 ____0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 2 ___ 1 ___ 1* ___ 3 ____0 hudsonvalley21 ____________0 ____ 0 ____ 0 ___ 0 ____ 0^____0 ____0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ____0 ___ Consensus ____________ 0 ____ 0 ____ 0 ___ 0 ____ 0 ____0 ____0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 1 ___ 0 ____0 wxdude64 _________________0 ____ 0 ____ 0 ___ 0 ____ 0 ____0 ____0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 1 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ____0 BKViking __________________ 0 ____ 0 ____ 0 ___ 0 ____ 0 ____0 ____0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ____0 Roger Smith _______________ 0 ____ 0 ____ 0 ___ 0 ____ 0 ____0 ____1 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ____0 Scotty Lightning ___________1 ____ 1 _____ 1 ____ 1 ____ 0 ____0 ____0 ___ 0 ___ 1 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ____0 so_whats_happening (2/3) _0 ____ 0 ____ 1 ___ 0 ____ 0 ____0 ____0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ____0 Tom (2/3) _________________ 0 ____ 0 ____ 0 ___ 0 ____ 0 ____0 ____0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ____0 ___ Normal _________________0 ____ 0 ____ 0 ___ 0 ____ 0 ____0 ____0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 Stormchaser Chuck (1/3) __ 1 ____ 0 ____ 0 ___ 0 ____ 1 ____1*____ 1 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 1 ___ 0 ____1 _ Feb Rhino16 (1/3) ______________ 0 ____ 0 ____ 0 ___ 0 ____ 0 ____0 ____0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ___ 0 ____0 (hudsonvalley21 has a tied top score for ORD (Mar) reduced by penalty). Shown as 0^ ----------------------------------------- EXTREME FORECAST SUMMARY So far, 25 of 27 forecasts qualify, 17 of them for warmest, and 8 for coldest ... Jan 6-2, Feb 5-3, Mar 6-3 FORECASTER _______ Jan _ Feb _ Mar __ TOTALS _ (adjusted for ties) RJay _________________ 5-0 _ 2-1 _ 2-0 ___ 9-1 _______7.5 - 1 StormchaserChuck __ -- --_ 5-1 _ -- --___5-1 _______4.5 - 1 DonSutherland ______ 2-0 _ 1-0 _ 3*-1 ___ 6-1 _______4.5 - 1 Scotty Lightning _____0.0 _ 0-0 _ 3-1 ___ 3-1 _______ 3.0 - 1 RodneyS _____________1-0 _ 1-0 _ 1-0 ___ 3-0 _______ 3.0 - 0 wxdude64 ___________1-0 _ 0-0 _ 0-0 ___ 1-0 _______ 1.0 - 0 Roger Smith _________ 1-0 _ 0-0 _ 0-0 ___ 1-0 _______ 1.0 - 0 hudsonvalley21 ______ 0-0 _ 0-0 _ 1*-0__ 1-0 ________0.5 - 0 so_whats_happening _0-0 _0-1 _ -- --___ 0-1 _______ 0.0 - 1 (all others) ___________ 0-0 _ 0-0 _ 0-0 ___ 0-0 _______0.0 - 0 ===========================================

+2.0 _ +1.8 _ +1.5 __ +1.8 _ +2.8 _ +3.3 __ -0.8 _ -1.0 _ -0.5

My understanding was that the NYC weather station was not in Central Park until 1920 or thereabouts, and was somewhere a few blocks southeast of the park in a more urbanized setting. That may account for the large number of high minima in the period 1896 to 1908 in particular when the numbers look a bit out of step with the overall temperature trends. The urban heat island is caused by retention of daytime heat as well as release of heat from within buildings (more of a factor in winter) and vehicle traffic (not likely to be significant before 1920). Possibly these very warm summer nights that show up in that era have some relation to the urban setting (as opposed to the park) and even back then the density of buildings must have retained quite a lot of daytime heat after hot, sunny days. While a lot of temperature trends are similar for Toronto (downtown) and NYC, I don't see this spike of record high minima in the same period; the results are closer to matching record high maxima. But the location of the Toronto downtown station has always been in a sort of park-like setting (a university campus) and has not changed much within half a mile of the instruments, even as the city has grown. That does have some effect as these parks are just relative cool spots within the wider urban heat islands, and won't be anywhere near as cool as similar sites outside the metropolitan area. Another factor to keep in mind would be sea breeze effects at JFK, a weak sea breeze might not penetrate the urban area as far inland as Central Park or even more southern portions of Manhattan (or Brooklyn-Queens) but it could easily get to the JFK location. A third point would be the random variability of temperatures in different locations during weather patterns with light winds. I found during some research as a student that you could find differences of 2-4 degrees within a few hundred feet in similar settings using calibrated instruments. It was simply a case of the air not mixing very efficiently, and in some cases the differentials could be quite large even closer together. The bottom line is there is no perfect location to capture the climate of any given region which would include a large city. Rainfall and snowfall variations of course are even more significant.

I hope to be able to post some evidence of natural variability cycles or at least effects if not periodic cycles, in April, once I get the graphs suitable for transfer to the internet. We have had quite a discussion here of different perceptions of the role of AGW, which is not really why this thread was created. I think we could either agree, or more likely agree to disagree, that some natural variability input into climate is currently interacting with the AGW signals, the question being, are those natural variations being overwhelmed, distorted, or do they hold their own and compete? I think a few people continue to think the entire climate variation we see today is from natural causes alone. I don't go that far and have always figured that what we see is a blend of human and natural signals. How they interact is an important question, but until we can identify what natural signals may exist, it would obviously be difficult if not impossible to discuss how they interact. My graphs will tend to demonstrate that the signals are basically just being warmed up and sometimes diluted but that they continue to exist. That in itself is interesting. Finding natural signals really tells us nothing about the likely future course of AGW, it could overwhelm all of them, or it could work through them, in other words, the worst of the warming influences could superimpose over top of what would have been the warmest times anyway (but not as warm? and by how much?). You'll find some of these cycles interesting, I hope. I get very busy at end of each month with contest management here and on two other weather forums, so I will get into this work after that comes and goes, maybe around April 6th and beyond. I don't have much of a workload otherwise, other than maintaining the data sets that I created years ago. Could I suggest in general that we've had a full enough (perhaps too much so) discussion of points of view on the AGW side of things, and let's try to reorient this thread to its original purpose, which I support, and see where that discussion leads us.

Predict the temperature anomalies (relative to 1991-2020 averages) for these nine locations: DCA NYC BOS ORD ATL IAH DEN PHX SEA Contest deadline as always 06z Apr 1st, or late evening of March 31st. Good luck !!