2026-2027 Super El Nino

[Stormchaserchuck1]

6 minutes ago, raindancewx said:

The 2015-16 El Nino screwed up the progression of the QBO if I remember correctly.

Did anyone ever figure out why and if it could happen again? I would think its decent odds for this year with this El Nino, even though the QBO is off a bit from where it was then.

Yeah, especially after Winter 15-16

2015 -26.70 -28.62 -28.15 -24.38 -12.34   2.18   7.45  10.96  12.07  13.38  12.79  11.39
2016   9.34   6.77   3.16   0.64   2.37   3.86   6.25  10.07  10.48  12.83  14.16  15.09
2017  14.92  14.78  14.35  13.88   8.01

[40/70 Benchmark]

10 minutes ago, raindancewx said:

The 2015-16 El Nino screwed up the progression of the QBO if I remember correctly.

Did anyone ever figure out why and if it could happen again? I would think its decent odds for this year with this El Nino, even though the QBO is off a bit from where it was then.

And of course we would have a season like that right after they stop calculating it monthly.

[GaWx]

37 minutes ago, raindancewx said:

The 2015-16 El Nino screwed up the progression of the QBO if I remember correctly.

Did anyone ever figure out why and if it could happen again? I would think its decent odds for this year with this El Nino, even though the QBO is off a bit from where it was then.

How do you know that the El Niño is what caused this? Couldn’t it just be a coincidence? I’m suspicious of that because I couldn’t find even one similar occurrence with any of the other super-Nino events!

@40/70 Benchmark@Stormchaserchuck1

https://psl.noaa.gov/data/correlation/qbo.data

[Stormchaserchuck1]

This is a great site to monitor the QBO. 

The Quasi-biennial Oscillation (QBO)

El Nino's effects do propagate to the Stratosphere and the Strat winds are opposite +QBO vs El Nino so it is possible there is some correlation

No other year on record was nearly as wacky as 15-17 QBO-wise. 48-53 maybe couldn't get out of -QBO and that had a string of La Nina's. 

[GaWx]

17 minutes ago, Stormchaserchuck1 said:

El Nino's effects do propagate to the Stratosphere and the Strat winds are opposite +QBO vs El Nino so it is possible there is some correlation

No other year on record was nearly as wacky as 15-17 QBO-wise. 48-53 maybe couldn't get out of -QBO and that had a string of La Nina's. 

Chuck,

I don’t follow you.

Do you see anything that could prevent a +QBO from starting ~now or in autumn and then going through winter? If so, what? I’ve been banking on it based on the common ~24 month pattern.

[Stormchaserchuck1]

16 minutes ago, GaWx said:

Chuck,

I don’t follow you.

Do you see anything that could prevent a +QBO from starting ~now or in autumn and then going through winter? If so, what? I’ve been banking on it based on the common ~24 month pattern.

Probably >95% chance it's +QBO for the Winter. 15-16 was also a rare 2nd year Nino that went Super so maybe that could possibly have something to do with it?

Closest multi-year Nino analog is 86-88 and that QBO was very uniform. 

[40/70 Benchmark]

36 minutes ago, Stormchaserchuck1 said:

This is a great site to monitor the QBO. 

The Quasi-biennial Oscillation (QBO)

El Nino's effects do propagate to the Stratosphere and the Strat winds are opposite +QBO vs El Nino so it is possible there is some correlation

No other year on record was nearly as wacky as 15-17 QBO-wise. 48-53 maybe couldn't get out of -QBO and that had a string of La Nina's. 

Yea, I know about that...but it doesn't have the monthly tabulations like this site (50mb):

https://psl.noaa.gov/data/correlation/qbo.data

And this one (30mb):

https://psl.noaa.gov/data/correlation/qbo.data

They stopped updating in February.

[Stormchaserchuck1]

19 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Yea, I know about that...but it doesn't have the monthly tabulations like this site (50mb):

https://psl.noaa.gov/data/correlation/qbo.data

And this one (30mb):

https://psl.noaa.gov/data/correlation/qbo.data

They stopped updating in February.

What's the deal man? The stuff that we have access to is pretty basic and it discontinues lol. I actually miss the zoomed in CONUS radar they used to have available, a combination of all the radar sites. Now I can just look at the SPC overview threats radar. 

[GaWx]

On 7/17/2026 at 7:39 PM, snowman19 said:

@Gawx

 Thanks, Adam.
 For the period May-July, we’re likely headed to ~-22 avg SOI. One has to go all of the way back to 1905 to find any year at -22 or lower for May-July! Then it was -27. But that was a second year Niño (moderate). The only other one was in 1896, a strong Nino. That was at -28. Per Eric Webb’s tables, 1895-6 barely missed a low end weak Nino because there were only 4 tri-months in a row of +0.5 surrounded by +0.3s! So, 1896-7 was practically a 2nd year Nino. So, 2025-6 with 2024-5 having been La Niña is in uncharted territory going back to the mid-1800s as regards the extremely intense summer -SOI.

[Stormchaserchuck1]

I am so curious to see what pattern we have over the Arctic next Summer after this Super, perhaps record breaking El Nino. The correlation with Nino 1+2 +time is fairly weak

Nino 3.4

[40/70 Benchmark]

34 minutes ago, Stormchaserchuck1 said:

What's the deal man? The stuff that we have access to is pretty basic and it discontinues lol. I actually miss the zoomed in CONUS radar they used to have available, a combination of all the radar sites. Now I can just look at the SPC overview threats radar. 

Just brutal; the world stopped with the discontinuation of NCAR.

[bluewave]

12 hours ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Yea, but there is more warmer water further west than that year.

I am wondering if the reason that the standard 2020s summer -PDO/+AMO atmospheric state pattern has dominated the first half of summer rather than an El Niño type is due to the standing wave centered more in the Southern Hemisphere?

El Niño has garnered a lot of attention, and this looks to be a large event for the reminder of the year. El Niño is related to cooler, wetter than normal summers in the US while La Niña warmer drier summers. I think the summer of 1988 cemented the impression that La Niñas support continental heat domes, heat and drought for the US. But looking at the temperature pattern across the US this summer so far it seems to be just the pattern that recent summers have settled in to regardless of the phase of ENSO. So far, in my opinion it is hard to observe the impact of El Niño on US weather just yet.

 

[PhiEaglesfan712]

15 hours ago, bluewave said:

My statement was correct. The winter of 2025-2026 was the 2nd warmest on record for the CONUS.

While it’s difficult to find a perfect match, the forecasts were close to a 1994-1995 outcome which was the 12th warmest winter for the CONUS.

So for the CONUS the seasonal forecasts were too cold due to the extreme nature of the warmth out West.

I kept the scales in (C )for a direct comparison to the ECMWF forecast.

https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/monitoring/climate-at-a-glance/national/time-series/110/tavg/3/2/1895-2026

https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2026/03/we-just-had-the-second-warmest-winter-in-u-s-history-despite-icy-blasts/

Rankings and departures out West were much higher than the East

Verification in (C)

94-95 was really skewed by February. The rest of that winter (November-January and March) absolutely torched in the Eastern US and was actually cool in the West. I'd say 14-15 was the best match for 25-26.

[donsutherland1]

The weekly ENSO Region 1+2 anomaly rose to +3.6°C during the week centered around July 15. Only the 1982-83 and 1997-98 super El Niño events saw comparable or higher values.  The last such anomaly occurred during the week centered around December 24, 1997 (+3.6°C). A strong El Niño is ongoing.

[bluewave]

55 minutes ago, PhiEaglesfan712 said:

94-95 was really skewed by February. The rest of that winter (November-January and March) absolutely torched in the Eastern US and was actually cool in the West. I'd say 14-15 was the best match for 25-26.

94-95 was close to what the Euro seasonal was forecasting and not what verified.

The closest actual 500 mb match was a much warmer nationally and less snowy version of 1995-1996 for DJF. Notice how the ridges overpowered the pattern compared to 1996.

It was the first weak La  Niña since then with a Bering Sea ridge, Baja SW U.S. ridge, and Greenland block.

This has been a common theme regardless of ENSO in recent years. Ridges have been growing stronger and more expansive.

The spring pattern quickly flipped to the standard 2020s pattern. 
 

 

 

 

[bluewave]

21 hours ago, mitchnick said:

By the way, why didn't you bother to post the Cfs2 temp forecast for the 23/24 winter? Since we're nearing the end of July, this is what it had from the 8/1/23-8/10/23 period. Pretty warm (and not very Niño canonical), isn't it?

That wasn’t a good forecast either for what verified. Still much too cool from upper Midwest into the Northeast.

You seem to be taking my model criticism personally in some regard by the tone of your responses. It isn’t my intention to put you on the defensive in any way.

It would be great if all the seasonal model forecasts were as good as the JMA for your best winter in 2013-2014. 

https://www.data.jma.go.jp/tcc/data/news/tccnews34.pdf

https://ds.data.jma.go.jp/wmc/products/model/map/7mE/map1/pztmap.php

 

[GaWx]

20 hours ago, snowman19 said:

Completely agree. IMO this is going to easily be the strongest super El Niño in history on the RONI and the traditional ONI for both peak and trimonthly average. I also think the August MEI goes above +2 and it would not surprise me at all if we tie or exceed the strongest MEI month on record sometime this fall or winter (*which I believe is +2.9 back during the 1982-83 super Niño*). I’m sure @GaWx has the actual MEI stats for that

Correct, Adam. 1982-3 bimonthlies peaked at +2.9. Get this, that peak wasn’t til April-May of 1983. Although April-May is very late even for the MEI peak, it does sometimes peak sig. later than the 3.4 SST anomaly peak. Why? My guess is atmospheric lag vs SSTa peaks since MEI has an atmospheric portion. There’s nothing better to illustrate atmospheric lag than to look at SOI lows for strong Nino events per the monthlies:

Event……..SOI low….SSTa peak…Lag (months)
1982-3……Feb ‘83…….Dec ‘82……..2

1991-2…….Jan ‘92…….Jan ‘92…….0

1997-8……Mar ‘98……..Nov ‘97…..4

2009-10….Feb ‘10………Dec ‘09….2

2015-6…...Jan ‘16………Nov ‘15…..2

2023-4…..Feb ‘24………Dec ‘23….2

 So, avg lag from SSTa high to SOI low for these 6 strong events was 2 months.

 MEI peaked late in 1982-3, 1997-8, and 2009-10 (although it didn’t in 2015-6 and 2023-4).

https://psl.noaa.gov/enso/mei/

[GaWx]

4 hours ago, donsutherland1 said:

The weekly ENSO Region 1+2 anomaly rose to +3.6°C during the week centered around July 15. Only the 1982-83 and 1997-98 super El Niño events saw comparable or higher values.  The last such anomaly occurred during the week centered around December 24, 1997 (+3.6°C). A strong El Niño is ongoing.

 Thanks, Don. It’s very warm there, no doubt, indicative of a strong Nino.

 I prefer to compare the relative weeklies for the best apples to apples comparison to the strength of past events due to the GW effect on tropical oceans skewing the straight ENSO anomalies higher in more recent years:

For the week centered on 7/15/26, the relative region 1+2 anomaly was at +2.8, a rise from the +2.6 of the prior week and the highest yet for this event.

How does +2.8 compare to past events back to 1982 in mid July?

2023: +2.8

2015: +2.3

1997: +3.7

1982: +0.5

 

 So, going back to 1982, 2026’s +2.8 is tied with 2023 for 2nd warmest anomaly in mid-July on a relative basis with 1997 being the warmest:

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

[GaWx]

15 hours ago, GaWx said:

Don’t forget that CDAS is slightly cold biased. But this chart isn’t relative. Relative OISST is in the +1.6-+1.7 range.

 I’m guessing that tomorrow’s weekly relative Nino 3.4 release will have it at +1.5 with +1.6 on the high end.

The weeklies keep coming in lower than my guesses as Nino 3.4 came in at only +1.4 for last week vs my +1.5 guess. This is surprisingly low when considering that it is OISST based. It is for the prior week averaged out, but still +1.4 looks low when comparing to this relative OISST graph. The avg of last week, the last 7 dots on the image below, is actually ~+1.6!

[csnavywx]

On 7/17/2026 at 7:57 PM, EasternLI said:

I wanted to make a post about this last fall, never got around to it. Watching a super nino develop now, and drinking some surfside iced tea's, I feel compelled once again to bring up something that's kind of interesting. Perhaps a clue that a super nino would have been on the horizon the following year? I thought the severely negative IOD last year was quite interesting. I had found a paper at that time discussing purely very strong negative IOD events. 

 

Diversity of strong negative Indian Ocean dipole events since 1980: characteristics and causes

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00382-023-07008-x

 

Notice the years where the strongest of negative IOD events occurred...

 

 

It's really interesting to me how 3 out of 4 of those years came on the heels of very respectable el nino years. But one however did not, and that one occurred the year prior to a super el nino. That one occurred prior to 97-98. 

 

They noted that three of those events are attributed to monopole events (mainly the warmth in the east). Not surprising, these three are the ones following the respectable el nino years.

 

 

The one year that was an actual dipole and featured the cooling in the west in conjunction with the warming in the east. Had the super el nino the following year (97-98). Unlike the others. 

 

 

The authors attribute that lone occurrence to local processes (in the IO) mainly. The other monopole cases are attributed to WWB in the IO which have links to enso. So when we look at last years case, what is the prognosis of that one? Clearly, there was no respectable el nino the year prior. Clearly, it was of the dipole variety in the sst anomaly data (image below). So it's interesting as hell to me watching this super el nino developing now. Potentially record breaking at that, following after a type of negative IOD which only really matches the year prior to 97-98. (I think the PDO is a major difference from that year specifically. May try to dig into that more later) Cheers.

 

Yes. The keystone paper you're looking for is here: 

Influence of the state of the Indian Ocean Dipole on the following year’s El Niño | Nature Geoscience

 

Made a note of it last year, but at that point it looked initially like a moderate event was most likely.

wxchris on X: "The recent record/near record -IOD is collapsing. Warm water is sloshing east towards the WPac, putting the fully mature Nina on borrowed time. Expect whiplash. https://t.co/rZb3PjimBU" / X

[40/70 Benchmark]

@Stormchaserchuck1, I think I know why the connection between intense El Niño and +NAO seems overstated....the causation for the +NAO during intense El Niño is likely more due to higher-end El Niño being favored during descending solar/peak geomagnetic energy, rather then the intense El Nino itself. Descending solar/high geomagnetic is the actual "smoking-gun" behind the +NAO causation, however, intense El Niño with all of that warmth leaking east does inhibit -NAO, I'm sure. The combo together is lethal if you're hoping for big blocking.

https://www.issibern.ch/teams/interplanetarydisturb/wp-content/uploads/sites/14/2015/01/Asikainen_03_2014.pdf

[40/70 Benchmark]

Notice 1997-1998 didn't have a big +NAO? It occurred during ascending solar, not too far removed from solar min....not to mention -QBO.

[snowman19]

Here comes the +IOD….there are no road blocks ahead to stop this thing from strengthening and strengthening

And with the projected TC forecasts, the WWBs and DWKWs are just going to keep coming

[GaWx]

6 minutes ago, snowman19 said:

 

 

Here comes the +IOD….there are no road blocks ahead to stop this thing from strengthening and strengthening

 

 

 

 

And with the projected TC forecasts, the WWBs and DWKWs are just going to keep coming

 

 

 

 

 

 

Do you have a guess for the +IOD peak?

[csnavywx]

Record warm water volume this time:

[snowman19]

3 minutes ago, GaWx said:

Do you have a guess for the +IOD peak?

I think it peaks strong come November

[snowman19]

1 hour ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

@Stormchaserchuck1, I think I know why the connection between intense El Niño and +NAO seems overstated....the causation for the +NAO during intense El Niño is likely more due to higher-end El Niño being favored during descending solar/peak geomagnetic energy, rather then the intense El Nino itself. Descending solar/high geomagnetic is the actual "smoking-gun" behind the +NAO causation, however, intense El Niño with all of that warmth leaking east does inhibit -NAO, I'm sure. The combo together is lethal if you're hoping for big blocking.

https://www.issibern.ch/teams/interplanetarydisturb/wp-content/uploads/sites/14/2015/01/Asikainen_03_2014.pdf

I agree Ray. I’m not understanding some of what I’m seeing on twitter calling for big west-based -NAO blocking this winter. Descending solar coming off a big max, high geomag, +QBO, super El Niño….sorry but that doesn’t scream -NAO blocking to me. But then again when you look at the account peddling that, it makes sense…..

[snowman19]

2 hours ago, csnavywx said:

Record warm water volume this time:

Here’s 1997 vs. this year, same time. The 30C isotherm east of the dateline this year sticks out like a sore thumb and like you said, we have record warm water volume this time around. We are about to leave 1997 in the dust….WWBs and DWKWs as far as the eye can see

Subsurface:



1+2 SSTs:

3.4 SSTs:

 

 

 

[Stormchaserchuck1]

4 hours ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

@Stormchaserchuck1, I think I know why the connection between intense El Niño and +NAO seems overstated....the causation for the +NAO during intense El Niño is likely more due to higher-end El Niño being favored during descending solar/peak geomagnetic energy, rather then the intense El Nino itself. Descending solar/high geomagnetic is the actual "smoking-gun" behind the +NAO causation, however, intense El Niño with all of that warmth leaking east does inhibit -NAO, I'm sure. The combo together is lethal if you're hoping for big blocking.

https://www.issibern.ch/teams/interplanetarydisturb/wp-content/uploads/sites/14/2015/01/Asikainen_03_2014.pdf

That's a good point. This is 2 years after a Solar Max:

We know that +AO/NAO is favored +1-5 years after Solar Max. 

Also, 4/5 Super east-based Nino's have happened during +NAO decadal phase (82-83, 97-98, 15-16, 23-24 -vs- 72,73). This year will make 5/6 Super Nino's happening in +NAO decadal unless we see a 09-10 type -NAO season. 

Check it out.. 13 February's in a row have had +NAO, and most are >+1.00 NAO!

2014   1.34   
2015   1.32   
2016   1.58  
2017   1.00   
2018   1.58  
2019   0.29   
2020   1.26   
2021   0.14   
2022   1.68   
2023   0.92  
2024   1.09  
2025   1.60   
2026   0.68