El Nino 2023-2024

[snowman19]

This is event developing like the El Niños of yester year….starting in regions 1+2 and 3 then expanding westward…..

[George001]

1 hour ago, snowman19 said:

This is event developing like the El Niños of yester year….starting in regions 1+2 and 3 then expanding westward…..

Still thinking we get an early peaking strong east based (EP) nino, but not super? I’m skeptical of a strong solution but it is looking more likely than it did a couple weeks ago. The 3 and 3.4 regions warming up is a positive sign for El Niño development. 

[so_whats_happening]

2 hours ago, snowman19 said:

This is event developing like the El Niños of yester year….starting in regions 1+2 and 3 then expanding westward…..

I feel like I keep seeing this reference to El Nino development of yester year, im not exactly sure what this references early 1900's mid 1900's? Can you post examples of such events and how they progressed other than referencing solely 82/83/. 97/98, or 15/16? All this while also coming off a 3 year La Nina event and having a rather cold PDO signal. I can't find many to reference some Im curious what these yester years are.

What did MJO look like during the spring? OLR and VP data shouldn't be too hard to find. I mean even 500mb charts will do or SST anoms. Something to help give us a clue what that means because im not gathering that from tweets. It seems like we are seeing steps being taken back on the whole Super Nino idea even from these tweets. ASO of max 2C is a step down from some of the model looks of nearing 2.5C if not higher by that time.

Honestly moderate seems to be the best potential as of right now and that may be stretching it basing it off of the idea we happen to get continual WWB events, it is very possible to not see tri-monthlies back to back to back above 1.5C by fall. We also need the MJO out of 4-6 and not dead. 

[Typhoon Tip]

3 hours ago, snowman19 said:

This is event developing like the El Niños of yester year….starting in regions 1+2 and 3 then expanding westward…..

I think it’s interesting that it’s outpacing the SOI index

[so_whats_happening]

You can see how the GFS develops a tropical system (equatorial Rossby wave) right around the area the hovmollers set it up around 150E. This brings about the idea of a nice WWB event and a spike in the MJO but many models seem to now be trending into the MJO dead idea. Here is the GFS and Euro for reference.

[raindancewx]

We're still running neck and neck with the great El Nino of 2017.

              Nino1+2      Nino3        Nino34        Nino4
 Week        SST SSTA     SST SSTA     SST SSTA     SST SSTA

10MAY2017     25.3 0.7     27.7 0.4     28.3 0.4     28.9 0.2

10MAY2023     27.0 2.4     28.2 0.9     28.3 0.5     29.0 0.2

In all seriousness though, we're in May now. Nino 3.4 has never warmed more than 0.4C from May to DJF in any year since 1950. Here are the similar Jan-Apr Nino 3.4 years I listed awhile ago in May. 

1957: 28.55C - we're running behind

1963: 27.63C - we're warmer

1972: 28.32C - continues to be dead on

1997: 28.58C - behind

2014: 28.25C - very close

I'm increasingly convinced 28.0C for winter 3.4 (+1.5C v. 1951-2010) is the right ballpark rather than the 28.5C - 29.0C the models try to show.

In the modern climate, Nino 3.4 averages around 27.9C in May and falls off by over 1.3C or so from May to Winter. So you essentially need the ONI (difference to average) to grow by over 1.3C to even offset the normal trend.

If you use 2014 as an example, it fell off from 28.25C in May to 27.19C in DJF, which is pretty close to the normal 1.3C fall off. The 1997 event grew to 28.87C by DJF, one of the biggest gains ever, but only 0.3C.  1963 fell off by raw temps. 1972 was the same in May and DJF. 1957-58 cooled off 0.4C or so from May.

I'd expect DJF to be around 0.4C less than whatever May finishes at in Nino 3.4, give or take 0.2C or 0.3C. We'll see though.

[jconsor]

Thread discussing potential analog years based on moderate to strong east-weighted El Nino, -PDO, warm tropical Atlantic/Canary Current and Wet Sahel.  The juxtaposition of relatively strong El Nino on the one hand and -PDO, very warm Atlantic and wet Sahel on the other hand (which generally don't go together with El Nino) is rather rare.  Need to go pretty far back in time to find appropriate analogs IMHO:
 

 

[snowman19]

[40/70 Benchmark]

11 hours ago, raindancewx said:

We're still running neck and neck with the great El Nino of 2017.

              Nino1+2      Nino3        Nino34        Nino4
 Week        SST SSTA     SST SSTA     SST SSTA     SST SSTA

10MAY2017     25.3 0.7     27.7 0.4     28.3 0.4     28.9 0.2

10MAY2023     27.0 2.4     28.2 0.9     28.3 0.5     29.0 0.2

In all seriousness though, we're in May now. Nino 3.4 has never warmed more than 0.4C from May to DJF in any year since 1950. Here are the similar Jan-Apr Nino 3.4 years I listed awhile ago in May. 

1957: 28.55C - we're running behind

1963: 27.63C - we're warmer

1972: 28.32C - continues to be dead on

1997: 28.58C - behind

2014: 28.25C - very close

I'm increasingly convinced 28.0C for winter 3.4 (+1.5C v. 1951-2010) is the right ballpark rather than the 28.5C - 29.0C the models try to show.

In the modern climate, Nino 3.4 averages around 27.9C in May and falls off by over 1.3C or so from May to Winter. So you essentially need the ONI (difference to average) to grow by over 1.3C to even offset the normal trend.

If you use 2014 as an example, it fell off from 28.25C in May to 27.19C in DJF, which is pretty close to the normal 1.3C fall off. The 1997 event grew to 28.87C by DJF, one of the biggest gains ever, but only 0.3C.  1963 fell off by raw temps. 1972 was the same in May and DJF. 1957-58 cooled off 0.4C or so from May.

I'd expect DJF to be around 0.4C less than whatever May finishes at in Nino 3.4, give or take 0.2C or 0.3C. We'll see though.

Same page..

[Terpeast]

11 hours ago, raindancewx said:

We're still running neck and neck with the great El Nino of 2017.

              Nino1+2      Nino3        Nino34        Nino4
 Week        SST SSTA     SST SSTA     SST SSTA     SST SSTA

10MAY2017     25.3 0.7     27.7 0.4     28.3 0.4     28.9 0.2

10MAY2023     27.0 2.4     28.2 0.9     28.3 0.5     29.0 0.2

In all seriousness though, we're in May now. Nino 3.4 has never warmed more than 0.4C from May to DJF in any year since 1950. Here are the similar Jan-Apr Nino 3.4 years I listed awhile ago in May. 

1957: 28.55C - we're running behind

1963: 27.63C - we're warmer

1972: 28.32C - continues to be dead on

1997: 28.58C - behind

2014: 28.25C - very close

I'm increasingly convinced 28.0C for winter 3.4 (+1.5C v. 1951-2010) is the right ballpark rather than the 28.5C - 29.0C the models try to show.

In the modern climate, Nino 3.4 averages around 27.9C in May and falls off by over 1.3C or so from May to Winter. So you essentially need the ONI (difference to average) to grow by over 1.3C to even offset the normal trend.

If you use 2014 as an example, it fell off from 28.25C in May to 27.19C in DJF, which is pretty close to the normal 1.3C fall off. The 1997 event grew to 28.87C by DJF, one of the biggest gains ever, but only 0.3C.  1963 fell off by raw temps. 1972 was the same in May and DJF. 1957-58 cooled off 0.4C or so from May.

I'd expect DJF to be around 0.4C less than whatever May finishes at in Nino 3.4, give or take 0.2C or 0.3C. We'll see though.

A moderate 1.3-1.6 nino would be good for the mid atlantic, much better than a strong/super. The pdo will have something to say about it though.

[snowman19]

Same page..

This is nothing at all like the El Niño fail of 2017

[40/70 Benchmark]

3 minutes ago, snowman19 said:

This is nothing at all like the El Niño fail of 2017

Did you even look at the excerpt that I emboldened? That isn't what I mean and it wasn't what he means, either. Pretty sure he was just sarcastically making the point that models are often initially too aggressive with the warming.

[40/70 Benchmark]

26 minutes ago, Terpeast said:

A moderate 1.3-1.6 nino would be good for the mid atlantic, much better than a strong/super. The pdo will have something to say about it though.

As will orientation....an event that remains heavily east based isn't good for anyone.

[snowman19]

Region 3.4 is ahead of 1997 and 1982 at this point in time and we are more east-based

[bluewave]

1 hour ago, snowman19 said:

Region 3.4 is ahead of 1997 and 1982 at this point in time and we are more east-based

But the subsurface has leveled off around 1c instead of 2c at this time in 1997. So 1-2 had a peak a few weeks ago before leveling off. Now 3.4 has made it to around .5c. Main question is how much warmer 3.4 can get just based on 1.2 spreading out instead of strong WWBs and a warmer subsurface. Will be interesting how much warmer 3.4 needs to be for the trades to weaken since the WPAC warm pool is still so strong. Probably will need the trades to relax to make it to 1.5 strong. 
 

Was around 2C at this point in 1997 leading in steady rise to super El Niño over 2C in 3.4    
 

So still no indication that we can have a super event this time around since WWBs and subsurface lagging those years.

Models not good at forecasting Nino 3.4 peaks until the summer.

https://www.climate.gov/news-features/blogs/enso

So, what’s the big deal in the spring? Especially when it comes to predictions of El Niño? It comes down to uncertainty in two of the main ingredients that give rise to El Niño.

1. In the spring, it is difficult to know whether surface west-to-east (“westerly”) wind anomalies across the tropical Pacific Ocean will continue through the summer and persist long enough to reinforce the developing El Niño.
2. The heat in the subsurface tropical Pacific Ocean is a necessary precursor for El Niño but it is not always sufficient.

Let’s focus on #1 first: the persistence of the surface winds. Dr. Capotondi has published research exploring the relationship of surface winds across the tropical Pacific with ENSO. She used a very detailed satellite-based wind datasetfor her analysis and found that the interannualchanges in the surface winds are the key ingredient for triggering El Niño (footnote #2). Without persistence of these tropical winds, many El Niño events struggle to achieve lift off and can fizzle. It is this interannual wind variability that determines whether you get a major El Niño (e.g. 1997-98) or an El Niño “bust”(e.g. 2014).

 

[40/70 Benchmark]

1 hour ago, bluewave said:

But the subsurface has leveled off around 1c instead of 2c at this time in 1997. So 1-2 had a peak a few weeks ago before leveling off. Now 3.4 has made it to around .5c. Main question is how much warmer 3.4 can get just based on 1.2 spreading out instead of strong WWBs and a warmer subsurface. Will be interesting how much warmer 3.4 needs to be for the trades to weaken since the WPAC warm pool is still so strong. Probably will need the trades to relax to make it to 1.5 strong. 
 

Was around 2C at this point in 1997 leading in steady rise to super El Niño over 2C in 3.4    
 

So still no indication that we can have a super event this time around since WWBs and subsurface lagging those years.

Models not good at forecasting Nino 3.4 peaks until the summer.

https://www.climate.gov/news-features/blogs/enso

So, what’s the big deal in the spring? Especially when it comes to predictions of El Niño? It comes down to uncertainty in two of the main ingredients that give rise to El Niño.

1. In the spring, it is difficult to know whether surface west-to-east (“westerly”) wind anomalies across the tropical Pacific Ocean will continue through the summer and persist long enough to reinforce the developing El Niño.
2. The heat in the subsurface tropical Pacific Ocean is a necessary precursor for El Niño but it is not always sufficient.

Let’s focus on #1 first: the persistence of the surface winds. Dr. Capotondi has published research exploring the relationship of surface winds across the tropical Pacific with ENSO. She used a very detailed satellite-based wind datasetfor her analysis and found that the interannualchanges in the surface winds are the key ingredient for triggering El Niño (footnote #2). Without persistence of these tropical winds, many El Niño events struggle to achieve lift off and can fizzle. It is this interannual wind variability that determines whether you get a major El Niño (e.g. 1997-98) or an El Niño “bust”(e.g. 2014).

 

Totally agree....this super el nino talk is far premature.  I wish the focus of this thread would shift back to more research and less Twitter regurgitation. That is what I like about Raindance....I may not agree with everything he says, but he always has a wealth of information to share about his thought process.

That said, this doesn't mean to imply that next winter won't suck again for the northeast....a moderate east-based event would be enough pull that off, so it isn't about a winter bias. 

[Typhoon Tip]

so it's 80 in KFIT and mixing with snow at Montreal

[40/70 Benchmark]

Just now, Typhoon Tip said:

so it's 80 in KFIT and mixing with snow at Montreal

Good stuff....can't wait to sling that boundary southward.

[Maestrobjwa]

48 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Totally agree....this super el nino talk is far premature.  I wish the focus of this thread would shift back to more research and less Twitter regurgitation. That is what I like about Raindance....I may not agree with everything he says, but he always has a wealth of information to share about his thought process.

That said, this doesn't mean to imply that next winter won't suck again for the northeast....a moderate east-based event would be enough pull that off, so it isn't about a winter bias. 

I mean...there's really only one person here that's stoking this, and I really wish they'd just chill. I think that person wants it so much they're hawking the idea with heavy bias...and it's making the thread harder to read!

[snowman19]

[Typhoon Tip]

El Nino's coming..

It's efficacy in modulating climate impacts is questionable.

[bluewave]

3 hours ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Totally agree....this super el nino talk is far premature.  I wish the focus of this thread would shift back to more research and less Twitter regurgitation. That is what I like about Raindance....I may not agree with everything he says, but he always has a wealth of information to share about his thought process.

That said, this doesn't mean to imply that next winter won't suck again for the northeast....a moderate east-based event would be enough pull that off, so it isn't about a winter bias. 

Generally need much stronger WWBs getting east of dateline plus subsurface warmth near or over +2 to go super. We haven’t seen either yet. Really no way of knowing what the peak in 3.4 will be based off of May and June Nino 3.4 to 1.2 surface temperatures. The ENSO models will just continue the momentum forward of what the SSTs are initialized at. That only works out in years like 15-16 with high upper ocean heat at strong WWBs. The models showed excessive momentum in years  like 2014 when the trades stayed up. If the trades can relax in next few months, then we could see a Nino 3.4 peak of +1.4 to +1.9. But if the trades stay up, then we would probably only peak +0.8 to +1.3 and run the risk of not coupling enough due to WPAC warm pool like got in 18-19. Then we would be looking at another Nina-like winter next year. The WPAC warm pool remains the wild card. 

[GaWx]

On 5/14/2023 at 2:34 PM, GaWx said:

Followup: similar with good chance of significantly BN SLP at Tahiti much of next week due to several pretty strong low pressures moving by to the south. It appears that most days for the rest of the month will be negative as it looks right now per model consensus.

 The MTD SOI continues to drop and is now down to -7 after eight days in a row of sub -10. That's the first time for that long of a sub -10 streak since Sept of 2019. The next seven days' SLPs at Darwin are forecasted to remain well above normal with a short term peak ~5/22. Also, Tahiti is starting from ~5/21 forecasted to have BN SLP for most of the rest of the month with some days MB.

 So, bottom line is that May will end up with a solid -SOI with sub -10 becoming increasingly likely, a strong leading indicator for El Niño.

[raindancewx]

The Jamstec seems to have a lower peak than a lot of the other models. Also has the transition away from an east-based event in Fall. I've mentioned that as a fairly likely outcome.

For now, my assumption is an early peak in Nino 3.4. Halloween, plus or minus 30 days. Slow weakening after. The 1972-73 event weakened quickly despite a very healthy peak. Part of that is just how many La Ninas surrounded it: 1970-71, 1971-72, 1973-74, 1974-75, 1975-76. Never really had much of a chance.

We've had multiple multi-year warm ENSO year events recently. I don't buy three initializing El Nino events in a row lasting two years each initialization. The image showing Nino 3.4 falling below +0.5C by winter 2024-25 matches my expectations. But I'd expect to be on the low side of the envelope starting around Jan-Feb.

[40/70 Benchmark]

13 hours ago, bluewave said:

Generally need much stronger WWBs getting east of dateline plus subsurface warmth near or over +2 to go super. We haven’t seen either yet. Really no way of knowing what the peak in 3.4 will be based off of May and June Nino 3.4 to 1.2 surface temperatures. The ENSO models will just continue the momentum forward of what the SSTs are initialized at. That only works out in years like 15-16 with high upper ocean heat at strong WWBs. The models showed excessive momentum in years  like 2014 when the trades stayed up. If the trades can relax in next few months, then we could see a Nino 3.4 peak of +1.4 to +1.9. But if the trades stay up, then we would probably only peak +0.8 to +1.3 and run the risk of not coupling enough due to WPAC warm pool like got in 18-19. Then we would be looking at another Nina-like winter next year. The WPAC warm pool remains the wild card. 

You know, I am honestly toying with the notion of using that relative ONI that Larry referenced last week....essentially ONI -.4....ie 1.5 ONI will equate to a 1.1 adjusted ONI and hence that level of forcing on the atmosphere. On the flip end of the spectrum...this past season illustrated how utterly useless the ONI can be with respect to diagnosing winter, as the RONI had to have been much lower than 1.0.

[40/70 Benchmark]

9 hours ago, raindancewx said:

The Jamstec seems to have a lower peak than a lot of the other models. Also has the transition away from an east-based event in Fall. I've mentioned that as a fairly likely outcome.

For now, my assumption is an early peak in Nino 3.4. Halloween, plus or minus 30 days. Slow weakening after. The 1972-73 event weakened quickly despite a very healthy peak. Part of that is just how many La Ninas surrounded it: 1970-71, 1971-72, 1973-74, 1974-75, 1975-76. Never really had much of a chance.

We've had multiple multi-year warm ENSO year events recently. I don't buy three initializing El Nino events in a row lasting two years each initialization. The image showing Nino 3.4 falling below +0.5C by winter 2024-25 matches my expectations. But I'd expect to be on the low side of the envelope starting around Jan-Feb.

Yea, I mentioned that a couple of pages back...I would take my chances with a Jamstec type of outcome.

[snowman19]

[bluewave]

1 hour ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

You know, I am honestly toying with the notion of using that relative ONI that Larry referenced last week....essentially ONI -.4....ie 1.5 ONI will equate to a 1.1 adjusted ONI and hence that level of forcing on the atmosphere. On the flip end of the spectrum...this past season illustrated how utterly useless the ONI can be with respect to diagnosing winter, as the RONI had to have been much lower than 1.0.

La Ninas seem to have been working differently since 10-11. Our strongest La Ninas years in multiyear events have been snowier around NYC. The weaker ones had less snow. 

Lowest fall into winter trimonthly ONI and NYC snowfall

https://origin.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/ensostuff/ONI_v5.php

22-23….-1.0…2.3”

21-22…..-1.0…17.9”

20-21….-1.3…38.6”….strongest of 3 year event

17-18…..-1.0…..40.9”…strongest of 2 year event

16-17……-0.7….30.2”

 

11-12…..-1.1…..7.4”

10-11……-1.6…60.4”….strongest of 2 year event

 

 

 

[40/70 Benchmark]

32 minutes ago, bluewave said:

La Ninas seem to have been working differently since 10-11. Our strongest La Ninas years in multiyear events have been snowier around NYC. The weaker ones had less snow. 

Lowest fall into winter trimonthly ONI and NYC snowfall

https://origin.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/ensostuff/ONI_v5.php

22-23….-1.0…2.3”

21-22…..-1.0…17.9”

20-21….-1.3…38.6”….strongest of 3 year event

17-18…..-1.0…..40.9”…strongest of 2 year event

16-17……-0.7….30.2”

 

11-12…..-1.1…..7.4”

10-11……-1.6…60.4”….strongest of 2 year event

 

 

 

Well, some of that is due to orientation, too.....which is often more important than strength. Years like 2010-2011 and 2020-2021 had an east tilt.

[bluewave]

19 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Well, some of that is due to orientation, too.....which is often more important than strength. Years like 2010-2011 and 2020-2021 had an east tilt.

Yeah, the stronger years were colder near SA but still pretty cold back to Nino 4.

Snowier composite NYC

Less snowy