GaWx

4 hours ago, BooneWX said:

I get a feeling when we break out of this, we’ll do the polar opposite. Rainfall has been a case of too little or too much the past few years. It’s either bone dry or a flood risk. We really stink at doing it the old fashioned way by having that weekly type of event. 

 Today’s Euro Weeklies run is the wettest yet for the SE as a whole for Apr 27-May 3rd with ~1.25-1.75” over much of the area!

 
And as an added bonus, the subsequent week (May 4-10) has a bit of a wetter signal than prior runs had:

15 minutes ago, snowman19 said:

 

 

“Interestingly, the 28 Degree Isotherm today is close to where it was around the same time in 1997. The maximum temperature in the basin is higher this year. The west Pacific downwelling wave is stronger this year back to the west, in response to the bigger westerly wind event this year next to New Guinea. The 28 degree isotherm is starting to fold down across the east Pacific.”

 

Thanks, snowman. Keep in mind that Paul is comparing to 1997, when global temps were significantly cooler.

Impressive -NAO on the way:

I don’t know whether or not this was posted and figured this is as good place as any to post it. There’s a major GFS upgrade (v17) coming in Oct, which includes among many other things upgrades to its MJO forecasting:

The Environmental Modeling Center (EMC) is proposing to upgrade the NWS
operational Global Forecast System (GFS) and Global Data Assimilation
System (GDAS) from v16 to v17 in October 2026. This upgrade will
transition the system to a fully coupled Earth-system modeling framework
for global weather prediction, improved model forecast performance, and
expanded, enhanced products that cover all components of the Earth
system. The NWS is seeking comments on the proposed changes to GFSv17
through May 15, 2026.
GFSv17 introduces a coupled Earth-system model with components of the
atmosphere, land, ocean, sea ice, and waves.

- An increased horizontal resolution from C768 (13 km) to C1152 (9
km)using the Finite-Volume Cubed-Sphere (FV3) dynamic core.
- Introduction of fractional grids along oceanic coastlines.
- Improved atmospheric and land surface parameterization schemes

Record tied today at KSAV at 93, 2nd 93 in a row and 3rd 90+ in a row. 

17 minutes ago, NorthHillsWx said:

I want to believe this but it sure as hell isn’t showing up on modeling east of mountains. Keeps hitting 10 days then each chance dries up

Today’s Euro Weeklies almost as wet as yesterday’s for 4/27-5/3 in SE. This is ~1.1-1.7” for the SE averaged out. Fingers crossed. I’d like to stop irrigating for awhile. Plus we have restrictions.

At KSAV, they’ve had their driest Jan 1-Apr 17 (3.3”) and 2nd driest Sep 1-Apr 17 (9.9”) to 1931-2 on record back to 1871-2:

https://www.weather.gov/wrh/Climate?wfo=chs

4 hours ago, chubbs said:

Recent rise in Nino 3.4 SST is similar in timing and magnitude to last 3 super ninos. Chart below shows 1982, 1997 and 2015 along with this year.

Current RONi equivalent is ~+0.1 though it’s risen ~0.4 the last 4 days. So, in a few days it would be up a few more tenths if the same rise rate were to hold.

 How does +0.1 compare to RONI equivalent for the other 3?

1982/97: +.0.4

2015: +0.9 but it had a head start vs others

 So, it could be near 82/97 soon IF the rapid rise continues.

https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/data/indices/rel_wksst9120.txt

 The cold biased CDAS 3.4 is still rising rapidly as it is now up to +0.404, a rise of ~0.1/day the last 4. Equivalent RONI is ~-0.1 although bc RONI is probably ~+0.1:

2 hours ago, NorthHillsWx said:

We have eclipsed 90 for the third straight day at my house 

Back to back 90+ at KSAV with 3rd so far this spring. Today’s was a doozy at 93!

Great news on today’s EW for short term drought relief 4/27-5/3:

Yesterday’s run:

Today’s run is even wetter:

1 hour ago, snowman19 said:

 

Keep in mind that these are straight 1991-2020 anomalies rather than RONI equivalent anomalies that are relative to warm average global tropical anomalies. So, there’d still be some blue if that were the case being that there’s ~0.5C diff.

42 minutes ago, snowman19 said:

Subsurface anomalies over +5C showing up:
 

The 5+ is centered pretty far west (140-160 W, which is west central 3.4. Hoping that’s a sign that El Niño will be center to west based like Cansips suggests and not east based like NMME shows.

50 minutes ago, jconsor said:

University of Arizona has a bold forecast, much more active than other forecasts to date: 9 hurricanes and 4 majors with an ACE of 155.  Their model is based on machine learning initialized with ECMWF seasonal forecast SSTs.  They cite forecast significantly above normal tropical Atlantic SSTs as the main factor.  News release:
https://has.arizona.edu/news/forecast-2026-hurricane-activities-over-north-atlantic

More technical summary:
https://has.arizona.edu/sites/default/files/2026-04/April-2026-Tropical-Cyclone-Forecast.pdf

Seasonal hurricane predictions that have been issued so far:
https://seasonalhurricanepredictions.bsc.es/forecast/seasonal-prediction

Univ. of Arizona has a very good track record.  They started issuing Apr outlooks in 2022.  Their Jun forecasts were notably higher than almost all others in 2017, 2019 and 2023 and ended up verifying well (In Jun 2017 they forecast 181 ACE and actual was 225, while most other outlooks were in the 100-130 range).  In Jun 2019 they forecast 151 ACE and actual was 132, while most other outlooks were in the 80-105 range.  In Apr 2023, they forecast 163 ACE and actual was 148, while most other outlooks were in the 90-130 range).  Notice that all 3 years had El Nino conditions at the time of forecast initialization and the Nino was forecast to strengthen - but in 2017 and 2019 that strengthening failed to occur and in 2023 the Nino ended up weaker than many models had forecast and while it limited Atlantic activity to a degree, it was less impactful than expected.

In 2022, 2024 and 2025 their Apr outlooks were notably lower than almost all others (In 2022 UA forecast 129 ACE and actual was 96, while almost all other outlooks were in the 150-190 range. In 2024, they forecast 156 ACE and actual was 162, with almost all other outlooks in the 185-230 range.  In 2025, they forecast 110 ACE and actual was 133, with most other outlooks in the 145-190 range.) 

You can download all of the historical hurricane season prediction data for past years from the Univ of Barcelona site linked above.

Personally I would go with an ACE range of 80-130 right now.  Main reason is I believe the standing wave of low-level westerlies over the eastern Atlantic and west Africa will help lead to an Atlantic Nino, energize the W. African monsoon (WAM) and lead to an active wave train, while as we know El Nino influence on shear is mainly west of 60W.  Also, the persistent very warm SST anomalies in the NW Pacific from E of Japan to S of AK and the SW Pacific east of AU/NZ (e.g. negative IPO) along with the above-mentioned Atlantic Nino and African standing wave would likely lead to resistance toward WWBs reaching the eastern Pacific (with the focus remaining near the dateline).  This would tend to shift the Walker circulation west of a typical moderate to strong Nino.

I think there's a 55% chance RONI stays below strong Nino levels through Aug-Oct.  Not ruling out a strong Nino, but I think a super Nino RONI-wise is unlikely (<15%) through Aug-Oct. 

My main analog years are 1951, 1963, 1969, 2006, 2015, and 2018, with more emphasis on the first three given the strong WAM that prevailed.

Thanks, Yaakov. Hoping the AZ forecast busts way too high as I’d like a quieter ACE for a change.

1 hour ago, LakePaste25 said:

 

 

 Based on the above maps for Jan, I’m going to consider renting a place in Anniston, AL, just for that month. 

2 hours ago, olafminesaw said:

 I’m targeting November for the change to consistently wetter than normal in much of the SE, which is typical for strong El Niño autumns. Until then lots of watering is anticipated during dry periods.

 But good news is that for well before then, the model consensus is showing a pattern change to wetter than normal in ~10 days and going into early May in my general area, where the drought is the worst in the SE. Fingers crossed that from then through Oct will be closer to normal overall.

Latest Euro Weeklies for Apr 27-May 3:

2 hours ago, GaWx said:

 

1. March ‘26 QBO: I just emailed the PSL

I got a quick email reply, but it contains bad news regarding getting QBO updates: 

“Hi

The QBO we have is produced using the NCEP/NCAR Reanalysis which has ended production. We are trying to determine how we will compute this time series.

See https://psl.noaa.gov/news/2026/r1datanotice.html

Cathy S.

Your PSL Data Team”

23 hours ago, GaWx said:

It’s the 15th and still no March QBO has been released. What in the wide, wide world of sports is going on? It never has taken more than a few days into the new month to release it.

 

29 minutes ago, snowman19 said:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1. March ‘26 QBO: I just emailed the PSL

2. More on the 3.4 warming: these are straight rather than relative

+0.531 for latest OISST, a rise from +0.15 just 4 days ago and implies a RONI having risen back to just above 0.0. Thus despite this rise, I still see almost no way April will average up at +0.6 for RONI, which is what BoM is forecasting: 

Latest CDAS, which has a cold bias: +0.25 vs ~0 just 2 days ago
 

 The EWs have cooled considerably for Apr 20-26 in the NE vs 5 days ago:

5 days ago: mild NE 

Today’s: cool NE

31 minutes ago, TheClimateChanger said:

Incredible! Downloaded data from SERCC (observations from March 1-April 14, forecast values through April 19) reveals nearly 80 long-term threaded stations are in the midst of their warmest spring on record, calculated by average daily high temperature. Led by Huntington, West Virginia, where the first 50 days of spring has seen a mean high temperature of 72.8F, an astounding 12.1F above the 1991-2020 mean. Again, that's a 50-day average!

Have you changed from the “Global Warmer” to the “US Warmer”?  
 The US has only 2% of the world’s surface area and only 6% of the world’s land surface area and that’s including Alaska. This is the same argument used against those talking about how hot the US was in the 1930s summers.

14 minutes ago, TheClimateChanger said:

 

Do you have Canada by chance?

It’s the 15th and still no March QBO has been released. What in the wide, wide world of sports is going on? It never has taken more than a few days into the new month to release it.

 Nino 3.4 SSTa levels have finally started rising during the last 2 days, a 0.2C increase. Often there’s a delayed response to strong -SOI levels as they usually don’t produce SST rises immediately (reminder: these are straight rather than relative but the point is the rise):

2 hours ago, Typhoon Tip said:

His linear, arithmetic approach to the question is not how nature works. 

He doesn't appear even aware of "synergy" in the system, emergent properties of complex systems that are wholly dependent upon the interactions of products, that cannot be very coherently pre- assessed or predicted because they do not exist until they are manufactured by the system.  

A+B -->  A'         C+D --> C'          ;       A' + C'   -->   A''       where A'' is the synergistic bi-product.

If we really wanna roll sleeves in how nature works, A, B, C, and D, are all partial derivatives occurring in time - it's really more like

d(A)+d(B) -->  A'         d(C)+d(D) --> C'          ;       d(A') + d(C')   -->   A''

We've been talking about this for years at this point in here.   The increased frequency of 'extra special' heat waves, Globally, surpassing all predictive tools ( sometimes by very large margins ), have already been denoted as "synergistic heat waves" in various climate publications/among the compendium of accredited sources.   

There's probably going to need some discrete reanalytic study, but it's much more likely that the heat in the SW U.S. during March was a phenomenon of this ilk.  

 

Tip,

Thanks for your reply.

 We know that the Arctic has warmed considerably more than middle latitudes, especially in winter. Thus, the contrast between the avg Arctic temp. and the avg mid latitude temp has lowered, which has reduced the avg speed of the polar jet. Thus per the source noted below:

“A slower and more contorted jet stream allows cold air to move further south and warm air to move further north, and it also allows weather systems to persist longer than usual. Under these circumstances, episodes of severe cold or protracted heat, as the UK experienced in spring and summer 2018 respectively, become more likely.”

https://theconversation.com/arctic-breakdown-what-climate-change-in-the-far-north-means-for-the-rest-of-us-123309#:~:text=The exceptional rate of Arctic ( the,and determines the paths of weather systems.

 But I still have to wonder if this phenomenon along with the up to 3F warmer globe were strong enough factors on their own to result in the W US heatwave being a record producer or would it without CC still have been a record producer but just at a lower level? I don’t see how this can be proven one way or the other. With the extreme heat so much hotter than the prior record, that would be quite the feat for CC’s influence.

 So, I’m at least for now maintaining what I said on April 3rd:

“had there been no GW the US still could have had their warmest month since the late 1970s but with not as warm temps.”

 All I said on April 3rd was “could”. After all, one would have to prove that it “could not” to conclude that I’m wrong. Fair enough?

 The final strat. warming occurred on April 9th, 13 days earlier than average:

@snowman19