GaWx

Sometimes the NHC is too conservative. Example: Don. It had no chance for development going out 7 days until it was within 5 days of being named.

1. But the typical El Niño induced above normal Caribbean sheer is still nowhere to be found on the model consensus, including fwiw the CFS into early September. It actually is the opposite! 2. The 12Z EPS looks rather active to me after August 15th fwiw. 3. I'm not entirely dismissing the chance that the AEW now in the mid-MDR that ldub mentioned in reference to the satellite pic becomes a TC within a few days.

I'm guessing that Nino 3.4 will drop to +1.1 in tomorrow's report from +1.2 last week.

The lower right is what the CFS is developing into a TS that hits the NE Caribbean late this week. Bears watching.

Should the CFS due to its inferiority be ignored? For at least two runs, it has shown a TS moving into the NE Caribbean late week while no other operational shows any TC.

Nino 1+2 SSTa is today up to +3.632C per OISST after an 8 day rise of 0.7C. Per this graph, tomorrow's weekly report (for the prior week) should rise from the prior +3.0C to ~+3.3C:

This is a much better way to state the heat of the water in/near the Keys.

This article includes the following: "Last month, temperatures of 38.3 C—as hot as a jacuzzi—were recorded off the Florida coast, which could be a world-record high for a point measurement if the figure is confirmed." The article has a number of valid points/stats illustrating the amazing record warmth of the oceans. But it could have been better if the writers had done their homework regarding what I quoted. They imo should have either left the quoted portion out or stated the reasons that the 38.3C at Manatee Bay buoy isn't a valid ocean temperature as regards world records as Dr. Masters said (so shallow you can see sunlight absorbing dark bottom (see below), 10F range that day/up to 3.5F hourly ranges, affected by tides, near shoreline/sheltered, water cooled to 84F 60 hours later (see below)). Furthermore, the 38.3C/101.1F isn't even a record for that location as it hit 102F on 8/15/2017. So, there was no way the 101.1F could be a world record of any kind: If they had reported on that same day's 92.3F at the Key West buoy, which is itself ridiculously hot and probably near records for it, that would have been legitimate. But due to sloppy journalism, they invite AGW skeptics to point out the Manatee Bay buoy's 101.1F as deceptive, which it is, and thus result in them discrediting the entire article even though the rest of the article looks good to me. Manatee Bay buoy: Sheltered near shore shallow with dark bottom: Fell from 101.1F 6PM 7/24/23 to 83.9F 5AM 7/27/23:

RE: Euro August run -Nino 3 for NDJ has risen from ~+2.45 last month to ~+2.75 this run -Nino 4 for NDJ has risen from ~+1.6 last month to ~+1.8 this month - For DJF on new run, here are estimates: 1+2: +2.4 3: +2.65 3.4: +2.3 4: +1.8 My guess is that most or all of these will verify a bit cooler due to warm bias. Regardless, chances of a super ONI peak have increased a little based on increases in Euro (now ~+2.37) and CFS (now ~+2.12) along with BoM not backing down from its upper +2s prog. But with 3.4 still rising only sluggishly recently (still ~+1.1 OISST and ERSST likely even a little cooler) and considering Euro warm bias along with OHC cooling to only +0.75, I'm continuing predicting only a strong ERSST based ONI peak as of now. I'm ~+1.8.

Indeed: 1. ONI peak has risen ~0.2 from +2.17 NDJ prior run to ~+2.37 NDJ this run 2. 1+2 has risen from mid +2s to high +2s Nov-Dec.

Based on the 12Z model consensus, my biggest concern for at least the next two weeks for the CONUS is for the period August 13-17, when the Bermuda high/WAR looks strongest, which may make it hard for a safe recurve. During that period, the model/ensemble consensus is suggesting that what's now coming off Africa will merge with energy/moisture now near 30-35W and likely move quite far west in the MDR at a very much up in the air strength (could end up being just a vigorous tropical wave). Bears watching.

Nino 1+2 just hit a new high today on OISST at +3.521! Compare the above to this June 21st CFS mean prediction based on the prior 40 runs, which had it at only +2.25 in July and +2 in August: Same with Nino 3 at +1.897:

The last several days of the admittedly inferior quality CFS have been taking energy coming off Africa about now and having it early next week collide with energy now WSW of the CV Islands. It subsequently has TCG in the MDR. The TC ends up threatening the SE US at midmonth. On these CFS runs, that has been the most threatening system of the entire month to the SE US. But again, the CFS is relatively inferior. So, this is fwiw, which may not be much. But it does have the last few CMC/GEPS in pretty good agreement along with the last few ICON and JMA runs to an extent.

1) The July OISST for 3.4 based on averaging the dailies calculated to be +1.10. 2) The July ERSST for 3.4, which is direct input into ONI, was just released and was +1.00. So, ERSST continues to come in slightly cooler than OISST in 3.4, which has been the case since December of 2022. 3) The MJJ ONI (ERSST based) was calculated to be/released at +0.77. 4) The MJJ RONI was released at +0.33. That means MJJ RONI was 0.44 cooler than MJJ ONI. 5) RONI-ONI: trending down since JJA of 2022, when it was only -0.01. Here are them since DJF: DJF: -0.14 JFM: -0.17 FMA: -0.26 MAM: -0.34 AMJ: -0.41 MJJ: -0.44

Regarding Arctic ice area, yesterday had a gain. Whereas having a couple of gains during summer is common, having 3 gains in five days isn't. There has been an average daily loss of only ~50k for the last 12. This is opposite of the June 29th to July 14th period when average daily losses were a much larger ~137k.

Although the shallow Manatee Bay's buoy this week hasn't come close to the 101.1F SST high of last week with 94.5 the warmest, the Key West buoy (over deeper water and thus a much more legitimate station) today actually hit a new hottest of the year with a quick spike up to 92.8:

Today's Nino 3.4 OISST anomaly dropped to only +1.072, which is the lowest daily in two weeks and is significantly cooler than the +1.255 of July 25th.

GEM has changed over the last year or two from the Crazy Uncle (as named by JB many years ago), when it developed way too many, to almost the opposite with it developing way fewer and maybe too few. I don't know for sure whether that's better or worse but I like the change.

The 12Z GEPS/CMC and 0Z EPS also show hints of increased activity for midmonth around the Bahamas to Gulf vicinity. This all appears to be from an AEW coming off within a few days. It really doesn't look quiet on the models in general from my perspective though model activity and actual TCs are not the same thing of course.

https://cyclonicwx.com/data/sst/ssta_graph_nino12.png

Whereas a week ago Nino 1+2 fell to +2.9 from a +3.5 peak six days earlier, it has risen back to +3.3 today (OISST).

This new run CANSIPS shear anomaly map, which is similar to the prior three runs, doesn't look the least bit like El Niño in that it has the opposite of the typical W shear anomalies in the Caribbean/MDR. From the perspective of a near coastal resident who sincerely doesn't want a lot of activity to worry about, this is downright concerning when also considering the very warm MDR and hopefully won't verify:

I agree that despite already being up to 5 NS and 1 H, these very active seasonal predictions will be tough to be reached. Regardless, this is a copy of a post from a non-met at another BB that I feel is relevant regarding July: "I think it's important to look at why things didn't develop. 95L and 96L mostly suffered from dry air (typical for July), easterly shear for 95L (El Nino shear is supposed to be westerly), and an upper low for 96L (not exactly characteristic of an El Nino either). None of these seem to be under the influence of an El Nino, and reflect more of a July climo than anything else. I'm not sure if an average El Nino season even has that many invests with real potential in July, to begin with. 95L also almost developed in the Western Caribbean, and probably would have done so if it didn't run into Central America. That would have been almost unheard of in a typical El Nino year with shear raging across the Caribbean."

Despite the chance it had to be higher at the end due to 96L and 97L, July ends up with one storm (H Don, which way overperformed vs most expectations), which is near average and about double the average for an already moderate El Niño per OISST. Don along with 95L, 96L, and 97L means July was not at all inactive and was more active than a lot of Julys and even more-so considering it being a moderate El Niño.

Consistent with the lack of El Niño atmospheric state, the SOI has averaged pretty neutral the last two months with -3 after the strongly -SOI (-15) of May. Also, check this out. The OHC was still dropping in the new update and was below +0.75 in late July per the latest graph after having peaked above +1.3 in mid June though it still has plenty of time to potentially come back up to new highs later this year: