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The Mystical Month of February--Long Range Discussion


Ji
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8 minutes ago, nj2va said:

Honestly, this is the first year I’ve tried to learn something about the MJO so I’m a self described MJO newbie.  It does seem like the prevailing thought is that the MJO has ‘controlled’ this winter...maybe I didn’t pay attention in other years or glazed past it, but did we talk so much about MJO in the past? 

Not really , I mean we did,  but this winter has been really been MJO centric ...... Lots of theories. 

I agree with Bob that there are other reasons and causes that give us sensible weather, besides the MJO.

But there have been a couple very unusual and record events with the MJO this Winter. These events have taken place very oddly with a Nino . 

For example,  one I recall was the highest ever amplitude MJO phase 5 in Jan ever, and also the most time as well in that phase .  All my facts my not be 100 % correct but its close. I know bluewave and Don S posted  about it. 

Another bizzare thing was the December SOI.,  positive for most of the month. 

So, many players involved but in a way you can zero in on the PAC and something there. 

I even read something today , maybe it was HM, not sure, but is was about the the Southern Hemisphere and the forcing and a bunch of other stuff. 

Now,  whether is was the MJO that screwed us or other factors that behind the MJO that dictate how it behaves , well that is up to  study and conversation after the winter is over.  

A fascinating winter for sure and frustrating as well. 

 

 

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44 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

Just my humble opinion here... I think the attention to the MJO this year is somewhat to alottawhat overblown. Not discounting the high amp warm phases and the trouble it has caused but there's more to it than that. No single oscillation or teleconnection drives the hemispheric or continental bus. Anything but a high amp warm phase is fine at any time during any winter because other drivers are equally as important. 

The SSW stuff this year takes the absolute f'n cake. All these previous years where weenies would have sold their soul for it but didn't happen and this year it happens nearly textbook perfect and 1)nothing goes as expected and 2) its blamed for our problems. LOL. Oh the irony... it's palpable.

Years when we hope for a SSW are usually because the pattern in place is crap and we would beg steal or borrow to have anything disrupt that progression for a reshuffle. This year we had what looked like a good pattern on the way and get the SSW and it was probably at least partially to blame for things going off the rails. Heh Ironic indeed. 

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3 minutes ago, frd said:

Not really , I mean we did,  but this winter has been really been MJO centric ...... Lots of theories. 

I agree with Bob that there are other reasons and causes that give us sensible weather, besides the MJO.

But there have been a couple very unusual and record events with the MJO this Winter. These events have taken place very oddly with a Nino . 

For example,  one I recall was the highest ever amplitude MJO phase 5 in Jan ever, and also the most time as well in that phase .  All my facts my not be 100 % correct but its close. I know bluewave and Don S posted  about it. 

Another bizzare thing was the December SOI.,  positive for most of the month. 

So, many players involved but in a way you can zero in on the PAC and something there. 

I even read something today , maybe it was HM, not sure, but is was about the the Southern Hemisphere and the forcing and a bunch of other stuff. 

Now,  whether is was the MJO that screwed us or other factors that behind the MJO that dictate how it behaves , well that is up to  study and conversation after the winter is over.  

A fascinating winter for sure and frustrating as well. 

 

 

Ultimately it all comes down to the fact that weather simply can't be predicted at long leads. I try hard like many to make educated guesses for long range prediction but it's always a humbling because earth's weather is way too complicated to be accurate as you go out in time.

I do very much agree that the mjo played a role with what's happened. Probably a significant role. But not one single long ranger pointed out that the mjo would be hostile when the season began. Also, there's a reason why the mjo has done what its done and there a reason for the reason and on and on. 

If the mjo is always a significant driver for wx patterns in the winter then long rangers are totally screwed every year because the mjo can barely be predicted 10 days out let alone months. Mod or strong ninas and ninos are fairly predictable so those years are less difficult and long range forecasts have a higher success rate. I really enjoy reading all the detailed long range forecasts. Unfortunately I've seen more bust than be accurate. That's not changing until I'm long gone from this planet, 

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43 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

Just my humble opinion here... I think the attention to the MJO this year is somewhat to alottawhat overblown. Not discounting the high amp warm phases and the trouble it has caused but there's more to it than that. No single oscillation or teleconnection drives the hemispheric or continental bus. Anything but a high amp warm phase is fine at any time during any winter because other drivers are equally as important. 

The SSW stuff this year takes the absolute f'n cake. All these previous years where weenies would have sold their soul for it but didn't happen and this year it happens nearly textbook perfect and 1)nothing goes as expected and 2) its blamed for our problems. LOL. Oh the irony... it's palpable.

I’m never one to root for a sswe unless we’re in a situation like last year with a hostile Nina regime where anything different is good because the outcome is highly unpredictable. Yea they cause tpv displacements and blocking but not always in ways that help us. Most tpv displacements are transient and cold but not that snowy here. The 2014 tpv gets credit when it wasn’t the cause of most of the snow that year. It was an east based epo ridge with a “just good enough” Atlantic side.  And not all blocking is helpful. Last March we got lucky but this year is seems to have caused a west based epo block that has been useless. Maybe the sswe did screw up the modoki nino pattern. Maybe it was doomed anyways. But it certainly did us no good this time around in how it manifested and that seems more common than last March. 

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41 minutes ago, dallen7908 said:

Did Europe or anyone benefit from the SSW this year? 

Saw somewhere that the return of ENSO-like conditions could lessen the impact of the favorable MJO phases we are forecast to enter.  That would be an ironic ending to winter and unwelcome support for your point. 

 

 

 

 

That’s utter BS.  The whole reason a modoki nino is good is because it favors tropical forcing in the central pacific which also mirrors mjo phase 8/1.   Also since a -soi means pressures are high near the maritime continent that typically prevents strong mjo phases 4-6 which feature convection there.  One of the benefits of a nino is it usually prevents a high amplitude warm phase mjo. This year that failed. But there are these crap posts that imply a nino is bad for snow chances and a return to Nino will kill winter when the failure to get a nino pattern was the problem. I’ve come to the conclusion there are some pro’s who apparently don’t know what their talking about wrt tropical forcing and still use the old super nino broad brush pattern on every nino.  

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14 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

Ultimately it all comes down to the fact that weather simply can't be predicted at long leads. I try hard like many to make educated guesses for long range prediction but it's always a humbling because earth's weather is way too complicated to be accurate as you go out in time.

I do very much agree that the mjo played a role with what's happened. Probably a significant role. But not one single long ranger pointed out that the mjo would be hostile when the season began. Also, there's a reason why the mjo has done what its done and there a reason for the reason and on and on. 

If the mjo is always a significant driver for wx patterns in the winter then long rangers are totally screwed every year because the mjo can barely be predicted 10 days out let alone months. Mod or strong ninas and ninos are fairly predictable so those years are less difficult and long range forecasts have a higher success rate. I really enjoy reading all the detailed long range forecasts. Unfortunately I've seen more bust than be accurate. That's not changing until I'm long gone from this planet, 

Imo the reason the mjo is getting so much attention is because of how anomalous it was wrt expectations. One universal thought for this winter was the mjo would be muted and likely not favor warm phases due to the nino and the relationships I said above. In other words a non factor. Instead it spent record time and record amplitude in warm phases which negated the main advantage of a nino which is to place forcing in the central pacific and mute it near the maritime continent.  So it was a significant driver that behaved very different than expected. 

I don’t know what other factors went into it all and what % was the mjo. But the mjo certainly didn’t help. 

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20 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

Ultimately it all comes down to the fact that weather simply can't be predicted at long leads. I try hard like many to make educated guesses for long range prediction but it's always a humbling because earth's weather is way too complicated to be accurate as you go out in time.

I do very much agree that the mjo played a role with what's happened. Probably a significant role. But not one single long ranger pointed out that the mjo would be hostile when the season began. Also, there's a reason why the mjo has done what its done and there a reason for the reason and on and on. 

If the mjo is always a significant driver for wx patterns in the winter then long rangers are totally screwed every year because the mjo can barely be predicted 10 days out let alone months. Mod or strong ninas and ninos are fairly predictable so those years are less difficult and long range forecasts have a higher success rate. I really enjoy reading all the detailed long range forecasts. Unfortunately I've seen more bust than be accurate. That's not changing until I'm long gone from this planet, 

They are screwed lol. But a big part of seasonal is using sst to predict the mjo tendencies. What makes enso events easier to predict is a nino and Nina typically have a more predictable effect on the mjo. Nina’s favor phases 4-6 and ninos favor 8-2 and or muted mjo. This year didn’t go to plan. 

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2 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

Gfs has much tighter spacing than 18z and faster. Also comes out of the west in one piece. That is the optimal combination. We don't want anything lollygagging in the west. Even has a hints of a good block. Nice looking panel here.

 

gfs_z500a_nhem_31.png

All the guidance has corrected day 6-10 to that look. Then they regress to a SE ridge again. I kind of have a suspicion that’s an error and we just roll once the cold gets in here next week. 

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4 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

All the guidance has corrected day 6-10 to that look. Then they regress to a SE ridge again. I kind of have a suspicion that’s an error and we just roll once the cold gets in here next week. 

Yea, it sure has the feel that once we get to next weekend the game has changed. My guess is even if the se ridge comes back it will be brief at worst. Could be a saved the best for last type of winter. Common theme last 6 years. March is the new December and stuff too

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1 minute ago, Bob Chill said:

Yea, it sure has the feel that once we get to next weekend the game has changed. My guess is even if the se ridge comes back it will be brief at worst. Could be a saved the best for last type of winter. Common theme last 6 years. March is the new December and stuff too

Winter seems to be January-March lately. 

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1 hour ago, jaydreb said:

Nice Miller A track but verbatim it’s not cold enough?

That's due mostly to a low north of the lakes. That level of detail is meaningless though. Way out there. I'm forecasting prolific digital snow this week and PWC might have to close schools at some point because of it

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Looked great at d7. The good news is it's under 10 days. The bad news is it's almost 10 days away. Really like the setup leading in. 
One thing I don't like it that it still wants to change over even with great 850s at onset. The se ridge is still a beast at 500
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4 minutes ago, Ji said:
14 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:
Looked great at d7. The good news is it's under 10 days. The bad news is it's almost 10 days away. Really like the setup leading in. 

One thing I don't like it that it still wants to change over even with great 850s at onset. The se ridge is still a beast at 500

All tracks are still possible and we'll prob see some miss south runs in the near future to offset the mixed messes. For now the window seems to be improving on the ens. You know how it goes... too much of a good thing and congrats nc. Not enough and we repeat today. I'm just hoping we get pull off a respectable storm of some kind. Long week ahead

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