Winter 2026-2027. Historic Potential

[JenkinsJinkies]

https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1601209068040844&id=100044552974374

[Bob Chill]

3 hours ago, Eskimo Joe said:

Issuing a winter outlook, even a preliminary one, in August is dicey. 

It's an "easy" enso setup to make some decent predictions if you just look at the Nino regions. Where I'm getting hung up is the Npac. There is so much warmth throughout the pac basin that it makes me far less confident predicting standard strong nino conditions. But given the strength of the nino, its hard to bet against a wet southern stream. 

Its still only August but if the Npac/pdo regions continue to be the opposite of what we really want to see, my gut says this winter will do some weird things that few expect/predict.

The pessimistic side of me thinks the pac will overwhelm north America and it will be warm and wet with few chances at good snowfall even to our north and west. 

The optimistic side of me says we're in a long term HL blocking period and even the EPO will punch cold to very cold air into the conus with a suppressed/favorable southern stream. Meaning the winter could be unusually cold east of the Rockies for a strong nino. 

I would be pretty funny if its a dry winter though. Maybe the southern stream cuts well west of us or stays south of the gulf coast lol

[Eskimo Joe]

3 minutes ago, Bob Chill said:

It's an "easy" enso setup to make some decent predictions if you just look at the Nino regions. Where I'm getting hung up is the Npac. There is so much warmth throughout the pac basin that it makes me far less confident predicting standard strong nino conditions. But given the strength of the nino, its hard to bet against a wet southern stream. 

Its still only August but if the Npac/pdo regions continue to be the opposite of what we really want to see, my gut says this winter will do some weird things that few expect/predict.

The pessimistic side of me thinks the pac will overwhelm north America and it will be warm and wet with few chances at good snowfall even to our north and west. 

The optimistic side of me says we're in a long term HL blocking period and even the EPO will punch cold to very cold air into the conus with a suppressed/favorable southern stream. Meaning the winter could be unusually cold east of the Rockies for a strong nino. 

I would be pretty funny if its a dry winter though. Maybe the southern stream cuts well west of us or stays south of the gulf coast lol

It's not unreasonable to be pessimistic on snow chances in winter anymore, especially south of 40N. We've been in such a long term snow drought that it's almost safer to forecast Above Normal temps and Below Normal snowfall. You stand a good chance of being right most years outside of New England. Heck, I could see this being a shutout in the snowfall department south of DC this winter. Several folks on here appear to have already punted December and the first half of January!

[Ephesians2]

[WxUSAF]

I’d expect the Nino will push around the NPac and at least bring the PDO more toward neutral if not weakly positive. 

[Fozz]

1 hour ago, Eskimo Joe said:

It's not unreasonable to be pessimistic on snow chances in winter anymore, especially south of 40N. We've been in such a long term snow drought that it's almost safer to forecast Above Normal temps and Below Normal snowfall. You stand a good chance of being right most years outside of New England. Heck, I could see this being a shutout in the snowfall department south of DC this winter. Several folks on here appear to have already punted December and the first half of January!

I think it would take a lot of bad luck to get shut out. It could happen, like it did in 1998 and that early 70s winter.

But with a highly juiced up STJ, I’d definitely take my chances. In 2016 we got a perfectly timed -AO/-NAO even after a disastrous December, and if that happens again then all bets are off.

The long range precip anomaly maps for the winter months make me feel pretty good about big storm chances.

[Stormchaserchuck1]

1 hour ago, Bob Chill said:

It's an "easy" enso setup to make some decent predictions if you just look at the Nino regions. Where I'm getting hung up is the Npac. There is so much warmth throughout the pac basin that it makes me far less confident predicting standard strong nino conditions. But given the strength of the nino, its hard to bet against a wet southern stream. 

Its still only August but if the Npac/pdo regions continue to be the opposite of what we really want to see, my gut says this winter will do some weird things that few expect/predict.

The pessimistic side of me thinks the pac will overwhelm north America and it will be warm and wet with few chances at good snowfall even to our north and west. 

The optimistic side of me says we're in a long term HL blocking period and even the EPO will punch cold to very cold air into the conus with a suppressed/favorable southern stream. Meaning the winter could be unusually cold east of the Rockies for a strong nino. 

I would be pretty funny if its a dry winter though. Maybe the southern stream cuts well west of us or stays south of the gulf coast lol

2 cold Winter's in the Northeast followed by an El Nino looks like this precip wise (10 analogs is a pretty good amount)

Now keep in mind that includes Weak Nino's and we are going to have the strongest on record by 15%, so maybe it's still really hard to get a dry Winter but I thought the analog composite was interesting (since we know how the dry pattern has been present for the past 2 years, minus wet July and Aug which has been the decadal trend 2017-2026). 

[katabatic]

4 hours ago, Bob Chill said:

It's an "easy" enso setup to make some decent predictions if you just look at the Nino regions. Where I'm getting hung up is the Npac. There is so much warmth throughout the pac basin that it makes me far less confident predicting standard strong nino conditions. But given the strength of the nino, its hard to bet against a wet southern stream. 

Its still only August but if the Npac/pdo regions continue to be the opposite of what we really want to see, my gut says this winter will do some weird things that few expect/predict.

The pessimistic side of me thinks the pac will overwhelm north America and it will be warm and wet with few chances at good snowfall even to our north and west. 

The optimistic side of me says we're in a long term HL blocking period and even the EPO will punch cold to very cold air into the conus with a suppressed/favorable southern stream. Meaning the winter could be unusually cold east of the Rockies for a strong nino. 

I would be pretty funny if its a dry winter though. Maybe the southern stream cuts well west of us or stays south of the gulf coast lol

You've pointed out something that I've had a question about for a long time. We all know that the NPac is way warmer than normal. But, does that matter (wrt our weather around here)? If the average ocean temp is say, 45, and we're now seeing 50-52, is that enough of a jolt to alter the Nino climactic expectations? I know there are other variables out there, but focusing specifically on ocean warmth, is the 'blob' warm enough (NOT just comparing to average, but total warmth) to cause what we expect (warm northern tier, cooler southern tier, dry Ohio Valley, juiced STJ etc.) to be materially altered? This may be too simplistic but if I go from 17 degrees to 24, that doesn't alter much. If I go from 28 degrees to 35, we have a whole different world. 

[Terpeast]

1 hour ago, katabatic said:

You've pointed out something that I've had a question about for a long time. We all know that the NPac is way warmer than normal. But, does that matter (wrt our weather around here)? If the average ocean temp is say, 45, and we're now seeing 50-52, is that enough of a jolt to alter the Nino climactic expectations? I know there are other variables out there, but focusing specifically on ocean warmth, is the 'blob' warm enough (NOT just comparing to average, but total warmth) to cause what we expect (warm northern tier, cooler southern tier, dry Ohio Valley, juiced STJ etc.) to be materially altered? This may be too simplistic but if I go from 17 degrees to 24, that doesn't alter much. If I go from 28 degrees to 35, we have a whole different world. 

I think you’ve hit on the million dollar question that papers are no doubt getting written about. It may influence storm tracks through the strengthening of ridges and weakening of troughs. I don’t think it will materially change the el nino expectations of a STJ and cool south, but whether we will have enough cold air is an open question. 

I did a crude study a few years ago where going from 17 to 24 degrees while replaying a previous noreaster track would juice the totals even more (assuming the same storm tracks, which is a questionable assumption to make). But if starting from a higher baseline temperature, things would fall off the cliff. We just have to hope we get cold enough air well timed with a STJ wave, and that’s partly luck. 

[Bob Chill]

14 hours ago, katabatic said:

You've pointed out something that I've had a question about for a long time. We all know that the NPac is way warmer than normal. But, does that matter (wrt our weather around here)? If the average ocean temp is say, 45, and we're now seeing 50-52, is that enough of a jolt to alter the Nino climactic expectations? I know there are other variables out there, but focusing specifically on ocean warmth, is the 'blob' warm enough (NOT just comparing to average, but total warmth) to cause what we expect (warm northern tier, cooler southern tier, dry Ohio Valley, juiced STJ etc.) to be materially altered? This may be too simplistic but if I go from 17 degrees to 24, that doesn't alter much. If I go from 28 degrees to 35, we have a whole different world. 

It's really hard to guess specifics but I look at it as an indication that the longwave pattern might not be typical. The large scale ridge/troughs may not park where they normally do on average. A key feature with ninos is a deep trough south of the Aleutians and a downstream ridge that blocks strong pac maritime flow into the conus. That's half of the split flow we look forward to with ninos. Screw that all up and things dont look as tasty. I'd sure feel better seeing a more typical +PDO ssta configuration given the strength of the nino. Not saying i expect disaster. Just not crazy bullish on the Pac as a whole.