NittanyWx

I think the giveaway was threefold on how bad the source region is/was: 1) Snowcover, or in this case the complete lack thereof 2) Lack of appreciably anomalous HP upstream And 3) +25s in the front weeks for N/NW Canada preceding this h5 change. While I don't disagree you generally will get better performance at h5, I think this was a situation where the forecasters had enough in front of them to say 'you know, I don't like the source despite the h5, I'm not gonna paint this significantly colder than the model because I don't see a mechanism where I can tap into anything'.. The play was to reduce the much much above for a small period and get closer to normal. But I think by mid-Dec you had a lot of reasons to question whether even normal is valid.

Go, avoid the tourist traps. Definitely do the sunrise bike ride at the volcano.

Yeah exactly on your last point, which I think was well articulated over the past few weeks. Could snow isn't will snow. And I think the main gripe I'd have if I was rooting for cold/snow is that plenty of folks shared the h5 of the weeklies as a sign for 'massive changes and improvement', yet there'd be no one sharing the t2m, which accurately showed the air being advected via PNA spike was mP due to an extended jet. Here's what I mean...two weeks back I was asked what I thought about the weeklies at work and I had the h5 charts sent to me and the following: 'seeing on twitter a lot of folks think this is a colder pattern east for New Years...thoughts?' My response was, did they share the 2m charts? The source region sucks, this isn't gonna deliver anything meaningful/prolonged in early Jan. The 2m charts were pretty damn warm at the time: Well, here's what we got at h5 surrounding New Years: I dent think that's a bad job by the weeklies at all. I do think, however, that it was a bad job by certain forecasters ignoring the source region and assuming that the Pac jet would magically ease and cold would just appear. There were plenty on here who disagreed with that premise, but I'd say that was more the minority opinion at the time. For what it's worth, the EC Ens has also had a cold bias, so risk is this may come in even warmer/closer to Euro weeklies. As forecasters, there is some element of strategy to what we do and what we communicate. If I see an h5 that's 'better' but I see no source air to advect, I'm not gonna ignore that source air and say 'you know what, the weeklies are way too warm because of h5 and it'll roll forward colder' personally. I'm not saying that to tout my forecast, I'm saying that because I think people got trapped up at h5, whereas some correctly (several in here to their credit) didn't see the mechanism for getting meaningful cold into NA for anything more than a slight step change/transient cool shot that wouldn't last without reinforcing HP and an airmass that wasn't cold to begin with and had no snowcoveras it was advecting into the region. So, yes, it can snow there, but a lot has to go right. I think the conversation was skewing more towards 'this is a hell of a lot better and split flow is exactly what you want'. The premise being there was longevity to a colder look and this would be normal. My point was the weekly didnt show that, it showed a better h5 but still a very marginal airmass. It's only 'exactly what you want' if you have a source airmass. Still keeping tabs on Jan 6-7, but outside of that there's not much in this for early Jan on either cold or snow

Already went a couple years back. It's a beautiful place and the people are truly special. Surfed Kuta and Uluwatu, did the temples, spent time with people and got to speak with several regular folks there. It has a special energy about it. If and when I retire I'm doing 2-3 weeks there with the Mrs.

In terms of sensible weather impact it's already dead. Indonesia is one of my forecast regions.

Yeah I'm more looking at it from a week 3/4 prog from the EC weeklies than inside the week 2 frame. I got a few charts I'm gonna share a bit later on today to articulate what I'm saying. As far as the EC Ens goes, it has had a bias for several weeks of heights and temps being progged too low d 8-15 for most of this winter.

You're missing what I'm saying...my post was about weekly h5 view on the EC weeklies for first week of Jan being the basis for a colder early Jan forecast. A point forecast would be averaged into a week 3 mean...

I think you should be feeling good about how this pattern looks at a long lead time. I'm also not calling anyone out specifically.

You're comparing a short interval of time to a weekly mean h5 view though. The source region is and was still garbage.

I think you misunderstood what I'm saying. I'm saying if the weeklies are already seeing it, as a forecaster are you adding any skill on top of it by coming out and saying 'this SSW will dramatically change things'...I'd argue going counter to the weeklies in the dramatically colder direction for example could end up burning you a lot of the time.

I can't blame weenies for being frustrated at a lot of early Jan forecasts. It will end up warmer than many were preaching based on the H5 look of the Euro weeklies. I personally am not canceling winter and haven't seen many do that outside of complaining about mild weather. but this is another case of 'know your source' when viewing h5 forecasts in the week 3-4 range. That said, I think the erosion of mild Pac air is somewhat less hostile than what we're gettng in early Jan

I mean, it can be something that helps turnaround...maybe? It can be relevant to the pattern relative to blocking in the right set of circumstances. But I think the better question is 'are the weeklies already seeing that' in their week 3-5 timelines and further are you doing a better job determining regional temp anomaly distribution than the weeklies are relying heavily on SSW as the basis for your view. Many times the climate models are taking a strato warming event and are assimilating it into those forecasts. So I'm not sure how much forecasting edge you're actually gaining from pointing it out.

It's something to discuss, but it's also only relevant for Feb...maybe...if it actually happens as progged. There's no issue talking about it, but a lot of people do tend to overhype the correlation to 2m temp, and specifically to 2m temp in the east.

You see a very small sliver of the pro's. Social media pros tend to skew cold because it drives interactions. I don't view Bustardi as an operational met anymore so much as a political pundit hocking books. He has long past his expiration date on reliable forecaster in the long range and a lot of folks have wised up to it. Margavage was in school when I was and flunked out, now returns as the 'cold and snow' guy and gets a following. There are a lot of good mets around, a lot, who's opinion I value and respect. Some of them were cold 1h Jan, many were not. But they're not gonna be the loudest voice on twitter.

Just personally I care way more about what's happening upstream right now given lack of carpet and atrocious source region. Think the 'way out' of this very mild pattern has to be this +EPO/-PNA combo, which likely means locally it's mild outside of a transient period around the 5-7 and cuts off the Pac flow into NW Canada for a minute. Then when you return to a more +PNA setup given background standing wave pattern you're advecting air that isn't just mild mP that has flooded into NW Canada.

You may have found a universally acceptable definition of persistence. Edit: card carrying member of #TeamWCanFirst

I suspect you will end up finding progression here in these VP anomalies as well. Particularly as the IOD has collapsed and there's a smoothing of ocean temperature anomalies between WIO and EIO.

This was a fun debate earlier in December.

Source region remains an inhibitor to anything other than transient early January cool shots surrounded by warmth. Keeping a side eye on the Jan 5-7 window in the event this low amps a bit more, but outside of that 'know your source' remains quite prudent. Looking bigger picture, seeing signs of the erosion of Pac air upstream into W Canada deeper into Jan. Should be less hostile then. But as far as this early Jan period goes, the book was written early. A modest h5 improvement, but lack of source air first week.

The GFS Ens is going to again beat the EC Ens in this post-Christmas period. Both will end up too cold.

I think this was well telegraphed personally. In years where you 'got out of it' after a very mild start, this was normally the step change observed.

Thoughts today: The lack of source region remains a barrier to significant cold despite h5 improvements. As such, first 5 days of Jan should average above normal before a transient cooler period 5-7th. Think the risk is cold air overdone by modeling in extended range and HP rolls forward less intense due to lack of snowcover and Pacific air contributing to that issue. Locally, we'd need to thread a needle for a significant snow and you only have a couple windows where I see that as possible early January. As I've said several times now, source is still vitally important. And we are in an improved h5 pattern with marginal source region through the first 7 days of Jan. That's not a death sentence for snow, but margin of error is slim. First period of interest would be Jan 5-7 range as some HP in Canada and a wave in the southern stream moving northward. I flagged this as a period of potential interest last week and thoughts haven't changed on it. Old adage is 'WAA waits for no man' but this is a situation where if you can avoid a coastal bomb you could get an overrunning situation into NE Canadian high pressure if the cards on the table lay out properly. Several things need to go right, theyre not all 'right' as of today, but that may change. Big picture, thinking this is a multi step process moving forward whereby the upper level pattern shift will be most notable during the Jan 8-15 window as we scour out some Pac air in North America, TPV retrograde westward (slowly), PNA drops and EPO rises. That should, in theory, start the process of allowing for some carpet to be laid in the Canadian prairies and upper Midwest later in the month. It's not brutally cold, but it's a way to begin to scour some of the much above normal temps in time. It'll be stormy, but mild here I think during that second week of Jan. Could have some much above normal temp days. Could you see something in that window of transition? Perhaps, but again need several things to go right and big coastals are a no go for snow here in this window. I expect polar regions to be less hostile heading into mid-late month, but the Pac still hostile for the bulk of early Jan. That brings us to the MLK weekend whereby you're looking for some of this cooler air to potentially migrate S/E ward as PNA rises and board resets towards more traditional Nino with potentially some blocking. Maybe. I think you've got a lot more reasons to be optimistic after MLK than before, with the caveat that you'd hope the Pac jet isn't as hostile as it has been if you're a snow lover. As an aside, I'm not considering any potential Strato interaction on this pattern until perhaps February, if at all. I just view any potential 'help' there as supportive of blocking and not necessarily supporting a Pac change.

MJO shouldn't be weenied for this one. He's right that most are calling for a warming event and potential split. It does look valid and will qualify as an SSW event in all likelihood. What will be overhyped is the correlation between SSW and t2m in the east. SSW events are essentially a correlation of a correlation to 2m temps. SSW inducrd PV displacement and splits are correlated to periods of more blocking which is correlated to colder temps in the mid latitudes of varying intensity and regionally/unevenly distributed. That correlation to temperatures is mostly 3-4 weeks after event. So this would in theory increase colder odds for the mid latitudes in February. But that doesn't necessarily mean colder in the northeast. It might, but it's not guaranteed. Historically splits work better for NA in analogs....but theres a huge caveat that the pac jet will need to relax and the EPO will need to be way less positive that it is right now. In short, its a situation where one of the factors we track in the weather becomes less hostile in theory to cold in the mid-latitudes. That said, we don't live at 10-50mb level, so it's one piece of a large puzzle.

Not enough cold air to tap into

I think we have different definitions of excited